On 2016-05-31 04:55, Veit Elser wrote:

Your tea is mainly cooled by evaporation (breaking hydrogen bonds), rather than conduction (to the air) or radiation (into space). You therefore want to maximize the surface area accessible to the tea — your second option. Have you tried pouring the tea onto a cookie sheet (with rim)?

-Veit

Have you any idea the look such a request would elicit from the Chinese waiter? They already mistrust me for asking how to use a fork. I suspect the actual surface area of the teabag might be comparably huge. --rwg

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On May 28, 2016, at 3:11 AM, Bill Gosper <billgosper@gmail.com> wrote:

I pour a cup. It's too hot and too weak. With chopsticks I remove the

bag

...

from the pot and dunk it repeatedly in my cup. Will my tea cool faster if I dunk up and down rapidly, or pause several seconds between immersions? --rwg