The quantitative content of statistical mechanics

• Quantitative structure of contemporary statistical mechanics is reviewed.
• Quantitative structure of contemporary thermodynamics is reviewed.
• Statistical mechanics is not primarily a foundational project for thermodynamics.
• Thinking of it as such can distort foundational study of statistical mechanics.

I give a brief account of the way in which thermodynamics and statistical mechanics actually work as contemporary scientific theories, and in particular of what statistical mechanics contributes to thermodynamics over and above any supposed underpinning of the latter׳s general principles. In doing so, I attempt to illustrate that statistical mechanics should not be thought of wholly or even primarily as itself a foundational project for thermodynamics, and that conceiving of it this way potentially distorts the foundational study of statistical mechanics itself.