Heat-death

There are various expressions of the two laws, the most succinct being that of Rudolf Clausius, who (in 1872) wrote The energy of the world is constant. Its entropy tends to a maximum (some authors translate the original German word Welt as universe ). In the 1930s, the second statement led to the idea of the heat death of the universe and caused much speculation. 

For example, she quotes Crookes s assertions of vitalism at the chemical level as an antidote to the heat-death of the universe that seemed to be entailed by the Second Law of Thermodynamics (1888, 1 603), or second-hand accounts of his lectures on the protyle, with assertions of its similarity to thinking in the Bhagavad Gita (1 681). 

It has been claimed that the second law means that the universe as a whole must tend inexorably towards a state of maximum entropy. By an analogy with a closed system, the entire universe must eventually end up in a state of equilibrium, with the same temperature everywhere. The stars will run out of fuel. All life will cease. The universe will slowly peter out in a featureless expanse of nothingness. It will suffer a heat death . 

In 1928, the English scientist and idealist Sir James Jean revived the old heat death argument, augmented with elements from Einstein s relativity theory since matter and energy are equivalents, he claimed, the universe must finally end up in the complete conversion of matter into energy ... 

The latter statement evokes the image of inexorable entropy increase as the ultimate progress variable of the universe. Entropy presumably evolves toward an eventual equilibrium limit that marks the end of spontaneous change in our universe heat death (Warmetod). Sidebar 4.9 warns against common conceptual errors that result from superficial application of the entropy-increase principle (4.48). 

If the long-term consequences of the //-theorem were applicable to all matter in the universe, one might expect that the universe would eventually run dow n" — although the total energy might always retntun the same, no useful work could be done with this energy, because all matter would be at the same temperature. This final state has been called the heat death" of Ihe universe. 

Bob puts his hands on his hips. Why don t you ask God to solve this problem We asked, but there is no reply. We don t want a heat death to happen. We must learn more. In order to increase our intelligence, we will swap the brain hemispheres of infants of different species. They ll all be hybrids with new ways of looking at the Universe. Our preliminary research indicates that they will think new thoughts and contemplate the fabric of reality in ways we can never fathom. We have the technology to fuse the brains, but not the intelligence to think their thoughts. ... 

A second example of an apparent absence of the heat-shock response was found in studies of cold-adapted, stenothermal Antarctic notothe-nioid fishes that never encounter temperatures above 0°C and die of heat death above 4°C... 

Pamela Zoline, The Heat Death of the Universe is anthologized widely. It can be found in Brian W. Aldiss and Harry Harrison, eds, Decade The 1960s (London, 1977). 

Keywords Planck system of units, L-regions (local regions), O-regions (observable regions), comoving frame, Second Law of Thermodynamics, heat death, Planck power versus heat death, low-entropy boundary conditions versus heat death, kinetic versus thermodynamic control, kinetic control versus heat death, minimal Boltzmann brains, extraordinary observers. 

Planck power and kinetic control versus heat death Big-Bang-initiated evolution merging into steady state ... 

It should perhaps be re-emphasized that even Planck-power input as hydrogen entails some entropy increase and therefore is thermodynamically irreversible, consistently with the Second Law of Thermodynamics while still thwarting the heat death. The heat death is thus thwarted via dilution of entropy as an island Universe [1] expands indefinitely, which is consistent with the Second Law [59-63] — not via destruction of entropy, which is not Planck-power input as hydrogen represents input at positive but far less than maximum entropy. Thus Planck-power input (if it exists) defeats the heat death predicted by the Second Law of Thermodynamics [59-63] even though it does not defeat the Second Law itself. 

Additional questions bearing on the Second Law of Thermodynamics will be discussed in Sects. 5-7. In this chapter, whether concerning Planck-power input or otherwise, we limit ourselves to considerations of thwarting the heat death within the restrictions of... 

Low-entropy Planck-power (or other [21-25,33-35]) input such as hydrogen in nonoscillating cosmologies, or two-time low-entropy boundary conditions in oscillating ones [61,62,101-105], would enable our Universe — and likewise any Universe in the Multiverse — to forever thwart the heat death predicted by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. It should be noted that there also are other ways that the heat death can be thwarted see, for example, Ref. [127], Hopefully, one way or another, the heat death is thwarted in the real Universe, whether within an inflationary Multiverse [89-94,105] or otherwise [88,89,101-105,127]. 

Kinetic control versus both heat death and Boltzmann brains ... 

Maxwell s demon provided a basis for a great deal of discussion on a spurious issue, i.e., the relation between thermodynamics and "free will." Was there a connection between the heat death of the universe and the exercise of free will This issue died away as it became apparent that the thing which distinguished the demon was superior information, not a will or desire. 

In the latter part of the 19th century Clausius law was also used to predict the heat death of the universe. Just as gas molecules left to their own devices in a closed box will reach a state of maximum randomness, it was argued the same thing would ultimately happen to the universe. At some distant time, the entropy of the universe would be maximized, a state of final equilibrium would prevail, and all processes would cease. This rather bleak outlook was shattered in 1929 when Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe is expanding. In a constantly changing universe, total equilibrium is unattainable and entropy must keep changing. 

You may have heard someone mention the "heat death" of the universe. Eventually (many eons from now), all energy will be spread evenly throughout the universe and everything will be at the same temperature. At this point it will no longer be possible to do any work. The universe will be "dead."... 

That is, all processes that occur in the universe lead to a net increase in the disorder of the universe. As the universe "runs," it is always heading toward more disorder. We are plunging slowly but inevitably toward total randomness—the heat death of the universe. But don t despair, it will not happen soon. 

What does the "heat death" of the universe have to do with quality of energy ... 

An age-old argument about the heat-death of the universe is also settled by the interface model. It relates to the problem that the second law of thermodynamics is time-irreversible, but based on time-reversible laws of physics. It has been argued (Boeyens, 2005) that, because the world lines in neighbouring tangent spaces of the curved manifold are not parallel, a static distribution of mass points must be inherently unstable. As systems with non-parallel world lines interact a chaotic situation such as the motion in an ideal gas occurs, which means that time flow generates entropy. 

Helmholtz predicts the heat death of the universe, based on thermodynamics. 

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