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The Joule and the Calorie

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The joule is the SI unit of energy; the calorie is a defined unit set equal to exactly 4.184 joules.

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A nutritional Calorie, written with a capital C, equals 1000 of these ordinary calories, making it one kilocalorie of energy.

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The calorie's fixed ratio to the joule is set by definition, not a measured value some future experiment could later revise.

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