Why will an ice cube melts faster in large amount of water than that of lesser amount?

Answer 1

The simple reason is that an equilibrium reaction is occurring. When the ice cube is immersed into water, there is a difference in temperature, and as a result of this an equilibrium naturally occurs, with the ice cube warming up and the surrounding water cooling down.

The ice cube will melt faster in a large amount of water than in a lesser amount because there is more surrounding water, and there will be differences in temperature between the water immediately surrounding the ice cube and the water surrounding the water surrounding the ice cube, so the outer 'layer' of water is warmer than that of the 'inner layer' (surrounding the ice cube), and this in turn warms up the inner layer and the outer layer cools down, still trying to reach equilibrium. Due to this increase in temperature the 'inner layer' tries to reach equilibrium with the ice cube and 'outer layer' of water even quicker, to produce a consistent temperature throughout the water. In a lesser amount of water there is less water to cool down, so the ice cube won't melt as quick as less energy is required to cool the water, unlike in the larger volume of water