Interesting question and one that leads to other areas of " Professionalism ", IMHO.
How hot is a brake ? What "resources" do you as a pilot or engineer have available to you in order to determine this ? Are there brake temp gauges installed ? Is there a digital thermometer available from your engineering organisation ? Can you see smoke ? If there is smoke, is there an accompanying odour ? Does the brake appear to be new ( colour of the carrier nice and fresh plus a ton of pedal fodder on the wear pin ) ? New brakes tend to " burn off " the build fluid which is a synthetic lube. Also, minor hydraulic fluid leakage will smoke off with a quite characteristic odour.
The suggestion to touch a brake has been, I would suggest, taken a little too literally. During a walkaround by either a ground engineer, F/E or Pilot if I did not see them hold their hand slightly above the brake, I would think that they are failing to use the resources available to them. It stands to reason that the closer you can put your hand, the cooler the brake. Experience will tell you if it is hot, or HOT !!! ( remember if it is suspected or confirmed to be HOT, there is a right and a wrong way to approach or exit the vicinity of that wheel )
This leads to the 2 most overlooked and undervalued resources I know of. Common sense and experience - and I don't just mean your own. What of the other resources available to you ? How many of you have built a relatonship of trust with some of your engineers or pilots that is built on mutual respect and acceptance of individual experience and demonstrated capacity ?
I stand to be flamed but if there are not situations where the word of a trusted partner in aviation cannot be taken at face value then we have come so far only to end up nowhere. A wise man will always evaluate the souce of his information and that should in many, but certainly not all lead to an acceptance that an " it's fine " reply from your ground engineer really is just that - nothing to worry about. To think that an " it's fine " is just an excuse to shirk work is an undervaluation of a fellow professional, in many cases. ( I would never assert that it's always true though ). His experience will have hopefully taught him that 30-45 minutes cooling on a widebody Airbus brake at around 375-400 indicated is actually no problem. Are you taught that releasing carbon brakes serves no purpose ? Check with your ground engineer. He may well have learned through experience that releasing them actually DOES speed up cooling. Consider the variables - what is the OAT ? Is there a cooling breeze ? Does the pack outlet impinge on the undercarriages ? How much time do I have ? is it a long taxy to the departure point ? Is it a busy period at the airport ? Would I expect a long hold ? Granted you may not always have the best resources available, so, err on the side of caution. Use cooling fans - whatever you have available to satisfy yourself that you can reach the FCOM/OPS manual limits
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It's a wandering post, I know but if you can't smell a bird injestion before you see evidence of it, then you are not using all the resources available to you.