if that particular forum of physicists were insisting that people can’t possibly be expending energy (beyond normal life-sustenance) to hold heavy objects because, “They aren’t applying force to the object through a distance.”
A better response to that would be that although holding heavy objects with maximal effeciency would expend no energy, humans are very ineffecient, and their muscles will convert chemical energy into heat in the process of holding heavy objects.
See my obviated reply to cousin_it: yes, the physicists are wrong to make this inference, and it’s because they are not using the appropriate model-to-reality mapping, which makes its usefulness appear questionable, and this negative appearance is further worsened when they get to the point of literally saying “Humans holding heavy stuff isn’t work.” (Which is wrong in both the lay and the technical sense.)
A better response to that would be that although holding heavy objects with maximal effeciency would expend no energy, humans are very ineffecient, and their muscles will convert chemical energy into heat in the process of holding heavy objects.
See my obviated reply to cousin_it: yes, the physicists are wrong to make this inference, and it’s because they are not using the appropriate model-to-reality mapping, which makes its usefulness appear questionable, and this negative appearance is further worsened when they get to the point of literally saying “Humans holding heavy stuff isn’t work.” (Which is wrong in both the lay and the technical sense.)