[FRIAM] Entropy Dux^3

Thu Jul 3 21:37:09 EDT 2025

Neat!

On Thu, Jul 3, 2025 at 8:25 PM Pieter Steenekamp <pieters at randcontrols.co.za>
wrote:

> Nick,
> You pretty much nailed it.
> But… maybe only 99.99% nailed it 😉
>
> You said:
>
> "If you put a bunch of energy into a system by heating, you can NOT
> recover all of that energy as work."
>
> In the real world, you're absolutely right. But in theoretical physics
> land — where unicorns wear lab coats — it’s actually possible to recover
> all of that energy.
>
> Here’s the trick:
> If you have a heat source at some random temperature and a perfect heat
> sink at absolute zero, then yes — you can get back all the energy as work.
> But as the temperature of the heat sink goes up, your ability to recover
> energy goes down.
> If the sink is nearly as hot as the source? You get next to nothing.
> Welcome to entropy.
>
> Now let’s imagine a silly little thought experiment:
>
> You’ve got Earth spinning around the sun, heating up during the day,
> cooling at night.
>
> But imagine night-time cools the whole planet to absolute zero. (Yes, the
> kind of cold that scares even penguins.)
>
> You also have a magic cylinder that you can open, close, and isolate
> perfectly.
>
> Here's what you do:
>
> At night, open the cylinder and let any warm air out. Let in some of that
> chilly absolute-zero air. Lock the piston in place.
>
> Close the vents (but don’t insulate yet) and wait for sunrise.
>
> As the day warms up, the air in the cylinder heats up and pressure builds.
>
> Once it’s as hot as it’s going to get — wrap it up in a warm, fuzzy
> thermal blanket (okay, maybe not fuzzy) and seal it off completely.
>
> Now wait until the next freezing midnight, when Earth is back at absolute
> zero.
>
> Unlock the piston and let the expanding gas do work as it pushes outward.
>
> Voilà! In this perfect little imaginary world, you've recovered all the
> heat energy as mechanical energy.
>
> The real world never works quite this neatly — but that gap between theory
> and reality? That’s where entropy sneaks in and steals your lunch.
>
> On Thu, 3 Jul 2025 at 23:42, Sarbajit Roy <sroy.mb at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> As I am primarily a Mechanical Engineer, who learnt The
>> Uncertainty Principle in Sem 1, and Thermodynamics 101 in Sem 2, I couldn't
>> then, nor, now reconcile Boltzmann's
>> S = k.lnΩ
>> to all that statistical Omega fuzzy stuff and so stick to the classical
>> theory which ignores micro/macrostates, and I've  not had issues through my
>> ignorance..
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Jul 4, 2025 at 3:00 AM Nicholas Thompson <thompnickson2 at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Thanks Sarbajit,
>>>
>>> George and  I have been working on a way of understanding this
>>> asymmetry which is kinda neat.  Here is George's summary of our
>>> conversation. The gist of it is that while you can bring chambers to the
>>> same temperature by heating and compressing, they are in different
>>> macrostates because aside effect of compression is an increase in density
>>> which heating does not produce.
>>> See:
>>> https://chatgpt.com/canvas/shared/6865db6493e88191a9023926478b3c01
>>>
>>> Nick
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Jul 3, 2025 at 4:08 PM Sarbajit Roy <sroy.mb at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> It has been a very long time (too long) since I studied the 2nd law or
>>>> Shannon. It's all very veiled and foggy just now, however,  I have often
>>>> wondered if Entropy is fundamentally about ignorance, correlations, or
>>>> something deeper?
>>>>
>>>> On Thu, Jul 3, 2025 at 11:47 PM Nicholas Thompson <
>>>> thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Dear Long Suffering Friamers
>>>>>
>>>>> I think I have now managed to come up with a macrostate statement of a
>>>>> phenomenon that requires entropy for its understanding.  It parallels
>>>>> Lincoln's aphorism about fooling all of the people.
>>>>>
>>>>> *Assuming friction free and quasistatic motion and total insulation
>>>>> where appropriate:*
>>>>>
>>>>> *If you put a bunch of energy into a system by working on it,**you
>>>>> can recover all that energy as work.*
>>>>>
>>>>> *If you put a bunch of energy into a system by heating it,**you can
>>>>> recover all that energy as heating,*
>>>>>
>>>>> *If you put a bunch of energy into a system by working on it,** you
>>>>> can recover all that energy as heating.*
>>>>>
>>>>> *But if you put a bunch of energy into a system by heating, you can
>>>>> NOT recover all of that energy as work. *
>>>>>
>>>>> I think this is the asymmetry that requires the invention of entropy.
>>>>>
>>>>> Am I finally getting my Dux in a row?
>>>>>
>>>>> Nick
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Nicholas S. Thompson
>>>>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology
>>>>> Clark University
>>>>> nthompson at clarku.edu
>>>>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson
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>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Nicholas S. Thompson
>>> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology
>>> Clark University
>>> nthompson at clarku.edu
>>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson
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-- 
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology
Clark University
nthompson at clarku.edu
https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson
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