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[Leafsnail]

Seriously. The universe is far wierder and more awesome than we can really comprehend with our current levels of science. Maybe beyond our comprehension or observation entirely. But it's still a pretty incredible idea. Maybe the unbendable, unchanging laws we know of aren't as constant as we'd like to believe. Of course, then there's probably laws above those laws that need a good thrashing if we are to truly tell physics to get bent.

And yet... the laws of thermodynamics have worked in every case we've come across, and have had all sorts of explanations to back them up.  You don't get upgraded to "laws" for nothing.

[Starver]

Well perpetual motion is impossible because things like gravity and such change over time.

Erm, PMMs are impossible, yes.  But not "because [things] change over time".  In fact, there'd be a good argument for being able to create a PMM if gravity did change (invest in gravity when gravitational potential is cheap to achieve, then when it's more potent push that power into some other form of storage that's now a better investment, perhaps...and/or, of course, vice-versa), although I'm slightly sceptical (would at least need an oscillating relationship, and you'd have to have enough advantage to overcome the inefficiencies and losses in the device, never mind any energy you're 'tapping off' the PMM for actual useful purpose.

Every PMM design that does not actually get fed energy from an external source (thus not making it a PMM) is essentially bunkum in a constant physical universe, and usually worse than useless because of even the standard energy losses (friction, etc.) inherent in the device meaning they aren't even a good way of storing the energy you may initially supply to them.

And I personally [think?] all matter was made up of energy at some point. So maybe in the far future we will tear solar systems apart to make an all mighty kingdom

IMO, that'd just be accelerating heat-death (or a similar universal process) locally for short-term gain.  Which is not to say that it won't happen, just I can't currently conceive of any advantage.

(Going into SF, 'to support a bubble of space-time immune to the end of the universe' is one idea, I suppose, but if the death of the universe is via Big Rip or actual Heat Death ends, you won't have had the system around any longer than the end of the universe itself anyway, so prematurely ending it can only rerally work by concentrating the gained energy into preserving a far smaller volume of space slightly out into the increasingly void-like future.  If we do end up in a Big Crunch situation, there might be good arguments for making such a sacrifice (especially as more and more matter comes 'within reach' of your energy-farming scenario) in order to try and survive the process and (hopefully) find oneself as a precursor civilisation in the universe immediately after the Big Bounce.  But there are arguments against that (e.g. you have to fight against a universe's worth of contraction, and even if you could utilise the rest of the universe as 'fuel' for this task, you'd lack the quantity of universe that you were holding within your Crunch-Proof bubble).  However, this is far more speculative than it is scientific.  I'm sure someone like Hawking would be able to pepper my thoughts through with buckshot in an instant.)

((Another SF idea that just came to mind is to 'use up' a bit of one universe in order to power a trip into a parallel one.  Except that in the short story on this subject that just came to mind, the errant parallel-hopping traveller hadn't taken into account that the entire substance (matter and energy, perhaps even existence) of the source universe had to be converted into energy in order to make the jump... Someone he visits and tells of his tale (while fruitlessly trying to find his way home) works out just too late to tell him how hopeless and destructive his quest is before he initiates the process again on his way to his next soon-to-be-doomed destination...   Also, I would these days I also might apply the same caveat (as per the bubble-of-protection example, above) regarding his not being able to utilise the matter and energy inherent within his travelling self... But that's still SF anyway.))

[Siquo]

And yet... the laws of thermodynamics have worked in every case we've come across, and have had all sorts of explanations to back them up.  You don't get upgraded to "laws" for nothing.

True, but the fun part is we only have to break one. If the first one is broken, the second one becomes moot, and vice-versa.
One day... we just might.

On SF stories: In River Of Gods they open a microscopic channel to a parallel universe, with a higher background-radiation, tapping into that universes natural energy-state that flows to our universes' lower energy state (conveniently, energy in all universes is in a convertible photon-currency). If the number of universes is infinite, we can do that same trick infinitely.

[ECrownofFire]

And yet... the laws of thermodynamics have worked in every case we've come across, and have had all sorts of explanations to back them up.  You don't get upgraded to "laws" for nothing.

True, but the fun part is we only have to break one. If the first one is broken, the second one becomes moot, and vice-versa.
One day... we just might.

On SF stories: In River Of Gods they open a microscopic channel to a parallel universe, with a higher background-radiation, tapping into that universes natural energy-state that flows to our universes' lower energy state (conveniently, energy in all universes is in a convertible photon-currency). If the number of universes is infinite, we can do that same trick infinitely.

Yeah, that's the trouble with inter-universe wormholes/travel/whatever. Infinite energy and mass, basically. However, if we tap into a universe that has different laws of physics, made completely of antimatter, various other things like that, then we're kind of screwed.

[Starver]

You don't get upgraded to "laws" for nothing.

Not that I disagree with you in principle but, semantically, scientific "Laws" are a bit misleadingly of relative authority.  Witness arguments (whoops, might be heading back towards the subject of Atheism here!) along the lines of the incorrect argument "But the Theory Of Evolution is still just a theory, unlike the Law Of Gravity which is proven!".  (At least doubly incorrect as "just a theory" underplays evolution, and the Law Of Gravity is still very open to being disproven (i.e. needing to be modified[1]), at the very least regarding the existence or not of dark matter/energy, the possibility that gravity is stronger but 'leaks' into other dimensions, etc, etc.)

Which is why it's often called The Theory Of Gravity, these days, anyway.  While the Thermodynamics triplets [edit: whoops, quadruplets, forgot the zeroeth law!] do still tend to be considered Laws, that's probably more to do with alliteration than because there's no equivalent of the Dark Matter fudge needing to be addressed.


[1] Not that Newtonian equations won't be useful for a vast majority of all future circumstances, just like the forumulae regarding time, length and mass alteration at relativistic speeds don't significantly effect a question about "two trains, one travelling from London to Edinburgh at 30MPH, the other in the opposite direction at 40MPH respectively and having set off half an hour later, at what point do they crash into each other thanks to systematic failures in safety and communication brought about by the Thatcherite privatisation of the railway system."

[Siquo]

forumulae

Forumulae: Formulas presented by forumites, of which only the premise and conclusion are presented, and the intermediate calculations are conveniently omitted.

Also: In Science a Law == Theory, but very unlikely to be disproven. In principle, there's no difference, and it can still be done.

[Starver]

forumulae

Forumulae: Formulas presented by forumites, of which only the premise and conclusion are presented, and the intermediate calculations are conveniently omitted.

Apologies, I was so upset that "disproven" was being highlit[1] by the spill-chucker[2] that I never noticed.  Pedant's Curse rules doubtless cover this, anyway.


Move along, now.  Nothing to see here.  TATDYLF.

[1] Or "highlighted", given "highlit" is self-referentially so...

[2] And without any suitable correction, when queried.  The best I got was "disprove n" with a space!

[Andir]

I'm sorry[1] but I[2] find it incredibly hard[3] to read posts[4] with a lot of footnotes.

[1] without merit
[2] Person, me
[3] difficult
[4] singular entries in a public forum

 

[Leafsnail]

True, but the fun part is we only have to break one. If the first one is broken, the second one becomes moot, and vice-versa.
One day... we just might.

We might, but the chances are ridiculously low, considering it would obliterate almost all of nuclear physics.

And even when the Newtonian ideas on gravity were proven to be wrong... well, they were (and are) still used, since they work reasonably well for almost all real world examples.  If the Laws of Thermodynamics are "disproven", all you'd really need to do is add "basically always" to them.

[Siquo]

I'm sorry[1] but I[2] find it incredibly hard[3] to read posts[4] with a lot of footnotes.

I don't mind them, I like it. It's better than what I do (namely, using parentheses (like these()) to elaborate on a sub point (such as this one (and sub-sub points like this)) which make sentences unreadable) since the structure of the post is denser and yet does not lose nuance.

Parentheses: an occupational hazard for programmers.

We might, but the chances are ridiculously low, considering it would obliterate almost all of nuclear physics.

No, it wouldn't, just as trains weren't obliterated by Einstein's relativity, but by Thatcher.

And even when the Newtonian ideas on gravity were proven to be wrong... well, they were (and are) still used, since they work reasonably well for almost all real world examples.  If the Laws of Thermodynamics are "disproven", all you'd really need to do is add "basically always" to them.

That is a lot more likely.

[Leafsnail]

It wouldn't have much effect on the practical side, but it would rock our understanding pretty damn badly.

[Starver]

I'm sorry[1] but I[2] find it incredibly hard[3] to read posts[4] with a lot of footnotes.

[1] without merit
[2] Person, me
[3] difficult
[4] singular entries in a public forum

 

Apologies from me then (as I'm about the only one who does it), but the way I think it's either that (footnotes) or some other method (like parenthises (like this (which, by the way, did not start off as a deliberate over-baked example, thereof, but I now realise has got to that point with this final (perhaps, oops, no longer!) level of nesting)), else comma-separated clauses where not ambiguous) which properly conveys my mode of thought.

It helps (me, not you) that I've come from a place where footnotes are regularly used to serious effect (and only occasionally as self-referential humour, because that gets a bit tired).  To be honest I much prefer to be able to read straight text and choose whether or not to divert to the base of that text for further exposition on a point at that precise moment.  While with the method being employed in this post you have to work and spend time dodging backwards and forwards within a single paragraph, with just the slightest visual hint of the boundaries.

Ok, so you don't have to go multiple paragraphs down if you do choose to visit that, but I always try (and fail?) to write any such branching monologue or explanation so that ignoring the footnote gives a logically continuous flow at least as much as would occur if I made the ultimate assumption that no footnotes were even needed and set it as a single undiverted thread of thought.

But I do wander.  That's me.  You ought to see what goes through my head and doesn't get written down.  Or gets edited out.  (Actually, often it's when I edit something out when other problems occur, because I lose some sense or explanation that I really should have kept, so I try not to do that so much.  Perhaps I just need more practice...)

So, anyway.  I repeat my apologies.  Unfortunately, I often have more to say than realistically can be compressed into something so pithy.  And I also repeat that (with the exception of the triple-nested level, when self-realisation dawned) this was not intended as a deliberate exaggeration of my own inadvertent 'art', but you probably won't believe that assertion...

[Andir]

No need... just having fun. 

Also, wth is with the privatization hate?

A quick search leads me to believe that there has been far more human fatality caused by deterioration and "train on train" accidents under the government run rail than the privatized one.  But to that I have to add a caveat... it looks like more train vs. non-train incidents have been recorded post privatization which makes the list look larger. (ie: pre-privatization incidents do not list as many train vs. car/people incidents where the post-privatization does.)

Also, looking at British Rail history, I feel as though I never want to ride a train there (if I ever visit.)  Thanks for freaking me out by making me look up this stuff.

Also, I do not intend on arguing this here... but I couldn't help but look up the numbers to dissuade the bias popping up.

[Leafsnail]

Well, it's basically impossible to do a fair comparison.  Rail safety standards increase as time goes on anyway, and more recently we've had privatised railways.

On the other hand, privatised rail has massively increased the fares and decreased the quality of service (for everyone except the bosses of those running the railways), so...

[Starver]

Also, wth is with the privatization hate?

It was an example question.  Consider the hypothetical questioner to have an anti-Thatcher bias, not myself.

(However, and I'm happy to parenthesise this, I'm probably politically more influenced by non-Conservative values than not.  Not to say that I'm socialist, and normally I'd consider myself a small-L liberal (by UK standards) but for several reasons I'm fed up with the Coalition as a whole, right now, so possibly a bit more left-leaning than I might have been under a minority Conservative government.)