Slashdot Mirror
Universe Has 100x More Entropy Than We Thought
eldavojohn writes "Previous estimates are now thought to skimp on the entropy of the observable universe. The researchers contend that super-massive black holes are the largest contributor of entropy. Since they contribute two orders of magnitude more than previously thought, the total of all the observable universe is correspondingly higher. The paper highlights (in gruesome detail) new issues that arise with these new calculations — like estimating us a little bit closer to heat death (moving entropy totals from 10^102 to 10^104 out of a maximum of 10^122)."
I can finally move forward with the plans for my Entropy Cannon.
Here's a link for anyone curious about the Heat Death of the Universe concept
http://www.mchawking.com/includes/lyrics/entropy_lyrics.php
And I was under the impression that all that black holes were good for, was for sucking stuff in that never can get out ? Oh well, guess I should have payed more attention in class as a kid...
I propose a Fourth Law of Thermodynamics: There's more entropy than you think there is.
Things are just falling apart all over!
Qxe4
Universe Has 100x More Entropy Than We Thought
Scientists must have discovered my daughters room.
So, it looks like we are closer to the novel than previously thought? And rather than witnessing the "end of the univers" (with dinner and wine) we are observing the cleaning crew (black holes) picking up the ... er ... mess?
L'esperienza de questa dolce vita (The experience of this sweet life) - Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy
Because of Neutron decay we've only 10^49 years anyway.
Oh, wait... that's going to happen anyway.
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
FTA: A black hole is the entropy champ because there are myriad ways for all the material that has fallen into it to be arranged microscopically while the black hole retains the same numerical values for its observable properties -- charge, mass and spin.
So a black hole's entropy = "we don't know by looking what's inside"? How exactly does that contribute to the heat death of the universe? If there was a million times more entropy in black holes, how would it effect existance outside of black holes? Is there a background process constantly checking the total amount of entropy, ready to reboot the universe when it reaches an arbitrary level?
Example: blood alcohol content.
Sure, a .5% BAC is lethal, but only if its in the blood that circulates through your body. Say you had a large organ you do not use with its own blood flow, and occasionally a tiny bit of blood from your main blood stream enters that organ and is never seen again. And now you find out that the blood inside the organ gets converted to 200 proof alcohol. This messes with your average BAC, but does it make you die any sooner? You will die of blood loss eventually, and no matter what the BAC inside the organ is, it will not speed things up!
With the "news" (circa 1998) that the rate of expansion of the universe is increasing, it seems to me that worries about the heat death of the universe should be put on hold. There's something (currently labeled "dark energy") about cosmology that we simply lack sufficient understanding of.
Granted, Evolution isn't the nicest PIM software on the market but impossible? I think that's a bit harsh a verdict.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
The universe is still expanding in all directions at the speed of light, then the entropy per unit volume will still stay low enough to be habitable, right? Or is the problem that the rate of increase in volume will not keep pace, since it takes longer and longer for the universe to double in volume at a constant rate of expansion?
I believe firmly in evolution and the Big Bang and all that, but in order for the universe to have been created at some point, it's first generally necessary to prove that it has a finite age. The Second Law basically proves that quite nicely. So the Second Law isn't all that useless to the arsenal of Creationists.
This is going to be the next mass destruction movie that Hollywood makes (they seem to be out of Natural disasters). Quick! We must fight entropy! Arrange the crayons in your box alphabetically and color.
It would be right up there with Speed 3, Glacier of Doom.
So if I connected my server's entropy generator to a black hole I'd never have to type a page full of gibberish to generate my SSH key pair again!
I guess that the smaller the black hole, the more problems you would have when trying to squeeze a planet into it.
Ezekiel 23:20
I prefer MC Escher.
No, "you can't win" is the first law of thermodynamics. The second law is: you can't break even. The third law is: you can't quit the game.
Just because you are paranoid does not mean that no-one is out to get you.
You fail at understanding both the 2nd law and evolution.
The Earth is not an isolated system.
So does this mean that the time it takes to evenly spread the matter / light which is not swallowed by the black holes is shorter than we thought previously?
I read through all the articles now, and I still don't have a clue.
What than, will the big black holes (without mass surrounding them) merge to a new gigantic super massive singularity effectively reseting the universe and causing the next big bang, and the next round?
I'm so confused..
Wouldn't that be Murphy's Law of Thermodynamics?
Wow, Vogons posting on slashdot!
Free Martian Whores!
I'm no scientist, but this doesn't seem to bode well for the theory of evolution.
Perhaps you haven't noticed, but there's a big energy source pumping low entropy energy into the earth. Its called the sun.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
As black holes evaporate due to Hawking radiation, does that mean that they defeat the laws of thermodynamics in some way? Next question. Would quantum mechanics offer any explanation as to why we are less close to heat death than we think we should be?
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
being haughty to AC is like shouting at a tree because a squirrel annoyed you.
I don't see anything wrong with the intent of the question. Maybe he read it and found it too complex. Maybe he didn't understand it at all. Maybe he didn't read it and thought Slashdotters could give the best answer - in any case, no one's forcing you to answer his question.
Well-played. Clearly you are The Master.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
I believe firmly in evolution and the Big Bang and all that, but in order for the universe to have been created at some point, it's first generally necessary to prove that it has a finite age. The Second Law basically proves that quite nicely. So the Second Law isn't all that useless to the arsenal of Creationists.
Except, of course, it doesn't. The "heat death" of the universe does not prove the universe has a finite age, in fact quite the opposite, it would imply the universe will continue indefinitely. It's just that, for the vast majority of that infinite time, it will be in a very uninteresting state. It tells us what the "end state" of the universe will be, but reaching the end state of the universe is not the end of the universe, the universe goes on forever in its final state.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
And I was under the impression that all that black ho's were good for, was for sucking stuff in that never can get out?
Well... that's what SOME people believe...
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
that's all i can say
FOXTROT UNIFORM CHARLIE KILO
Free neutrons decay. Helium (and many other) nuclei are forever stable, because the energy gain in neutron decay is less than the nuclear binding energy. Lower energy states are only available through fusion, with an optimum at Iron (where they'll be met by nuclear fission from the other side).
I did not know that 9 chevrons dialing need that much power.
If the current age of the universe is finite, then it must have come into being - been created - at some point. There's no real answer to how that might have happened within the real of science. Oh, you can say there's some multiverse which creates universes such as ours, but that just shifts the question: how was the multiverse created?
My personal creation belief is that our universe is itself a supermassive black hole in some much larger universe, and in that universe the riddle of creation has some obvious answer. Perhaps God strides around shaking hands and giving photo-ops. Perhaps you can see the moment of creation with a sufficiently powerful telescope. Perhaps that unvierse does not have afinite current age.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
The answer is now 84?
The "heat death" of the universe does not prove the universe has a finite age, in fact quite the opposite, it would imply the universe will continue indefinitely.
you avoided his point, which was not that the universe will end but that it began.
"the age of X" generally means not "how long until X dies or ceases to exist", but "how long since X was born or came into existence".
The apparent directionality of entropy over time might imply (in a general, imprecise way) that entropy had a minimum value at some point, that this point was the "beginning of the universe", and (so it's said) that a beginning with no antecedent implies some sort of creative force, i.e. god.
Not RTFA.
TFS fails to use them, so I must ask,
What are the units of entropy? Can they be useful at a macroscopic level... like in describing how much entropy your bedroom contains (before it simply must be cleaned)?
The Admin and the Engineer
Imagine what the universe will look like when the entropy has gone, lets say half way between now and heat death. It must be: a) Extremely random and unimaginable b) The exact same with extremely random black holes that pull the average up. Or does the increasing level of entropy in a black hole effect the outside of that black hole? Maybe the entire universe will be one massive black hole to account for every atom in the universe being completely random... I feel the entropy in my brain increasing... ugh
That was a David Letterman style joke apparently!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I'll take this a step further. Science is a useful methodology for the building of models that are extremely useful for making specific predictions. Whenever you forget that its a model, and start BELIEVING it, its no longer science. Most laypeople don't really care about science, or models, so long as "it just works" when you flip the switch. However, they like certitude. It makes them comfortable that when flipping the switch next time, the TV will keep working. Now, Newtonian Mechanics, for instance, works pretty damn well for building bridges. Is it real? Nope. But its a really useful model. It works within a context (things are large enough we can ignore quantum effects, relative velocities are low enough that relativity isn't worth considering, etc...). To say that Newtonian Mechanics is "right" or "wrong" misses not only the mark, but the target. Science is never "right" nor "wrong" in the manner in which you used the terms. It is, however, extremely useful.
No. Even with a finite age, there's absolutely no need for a beginning. Just like the positive reals have no first element (for each positive real, there's a smaller positive real; note that 0 is not a positive real), there need not be an earliest point in time.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
for TMI (To Much Information) this would be it!
Bill
It's my Sig and you can't have it. Mine! All Mine!
No, it was Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings of Greenbridge, Essex, England, who posted.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Currently Logopolis is venting much of that entropy into another universe using lock transfer computations.
Your argument is equivalent to Zeno's Paradox.
I don't work for bad-math people! :-)
10^104 - 10^102 = 9.9*10^103
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
It's hard to convince a Creationist that science is on their side, they don't even realize the irony inherent in the fact that their ability to communicate with each other is, by and large, facilitated by systems created via science.
Pffft, that's a buNch of b8la r aMlb m alkk)9()* 09 aKdf +!`af1 m 54& 783*hjT N6 2
Table-ized A.I.
Why do you assert that E=m? And why would E remain constant? (E+m) would be a constant, of course, but I think you're mixing terms and coming up with $something incorrectly.
Populus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur...
"Force shits upon Reason's back." - Poor Richard's Almanac
is in my garage and three of my closets, if the level of disorder there is any indication. I'm sure there's at least one supermassive black hole in there...
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Is that you ? Can you return my hockey stick, the kids are asking for it ?
And apparently that meddlesome Doctor has modded my message of universal conquest down, thereby denying me the victory once again. Confound him!
Dude can't rap.
Do you realize who you're arguing with? I think he knows what he's talking about when it comes matters like this...
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
As long as we are being literal, why should I trust the word of a demon? ;)
But anyways, who's to say the Universe uses our pedantic definition of "zero"? Perhaps the beginning of the Universe can be best described with an extension of the real number line where "zero" can be positive?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signed_zero
I propose a three level scale: Messy, Messier, and Messiest objects.
TFA gets it goofy.
"Universe Has More Entropy Than Thought"
Certainly more than the amount of thought that went into that title.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
This would mean that yesterday, SCIENCE WAS WRONG. I keep getting reminded how this can't happen, usually from people looking at fossil records of CO2 use to cool the Earth, then supporting things to remove CO2 from all industry.
Who was it that kept saying science can't be wrong?
Are you sure they weren't just saying that your arguments of why the science is wrong were, themselves, wrong?
Science can be wrong, huh? Are ya listening guys?
Yes, but that doesn't mean that science being wrong in the way you presuppose it to be is any more likely. So, yeah. There's more entropy in the universe than thought -- but still within the theoretical upper bound, so basically this is a refined measurement not an undoing of thermodynamics and cosmology. Newton was "wrong", but it's not like we discovered that actually masses repel each other. Similarly, our climate models are certainly inaccurate and will be improved, but it is highly unlikely to be in a way where CO2 is no longer a greenhouse gas and threat to the environment.
This is how science works. We guess, then we confirm it. THEN, AND ONLY THEN, is it considered fact.
To be pedantic, it's still not considered fact.
Perhaps you've been fooled by the people with the "If the government pays, I'll give whatever results they want" model.
Yeah, that's why when the government wanted the result that you do, the scientists in their direct employ still came up with the same answer as they had before and since. The administration had to tamper with the report and tone down the language, because scientists always make sure the result of their research says whatever the government wants.
Science is often wrong, because the whole process of science is one of theories refined through observation. "Science can be wrong" does not mean that your wishful thinking is an equally viable alternative. "Wrongness" is not binary.
The enemies of Democracy are
Woah, there, buddy. You've got the scientific process exactly the wrong way around. You guess, then you try to disprove it. If you can't, you see if others can disprove it. If they can't, then your guess becomes a working model for some small aspect of the Universe until either evidence contradicting your guess is discovered and someone else makes a better, more refined guess.
That's Science. Constant improvement to our understanding of the Universe via learning that what we thought before wasn't quite right.
If there is 100x more entropy in the universe that means there is 100x more stuff in the universe that isn't God, making the existence of God 100x less likely.
Atheist movement? ROFL.
FAIL.
Take this with a grain of salt. There are a lot of issues here that are not well understood. TFA points out that we don't know whether there are black holes with masses intermediate between stellar black holes and supermassive black holes. The whole meaning of entropy is not well understood in the context of general relativity. The jury is still out on the black hole information paradox. It's still a matter of opinion whether black hole radiation is purely uncorrelated blackbody radiation, or whether it contains subtle correlations that encode the information that was "lost" when various information went into the black hole. Basically you need a theory of quantum gravity in order to be sure about the answers to these questions, and we don't have a theory of quantum gravity. Another issue is that nobody knows the structure of the vacuum around a black hole. When you try to calculate the polarization of the virtual particles in the region of high curvature around a black hole, you run into all kinds of problems. The zero-point energy of the vacuum is infinite in flat spacetime, and it's infinite in curved spacetime. Nobody is sure what that means, but they can try to subtract the one infinity from the other and find the increase in the vacuum energy that comes from curvature. Then when they try that, they seem to get answers saying that the structure of black holes can be radically different from what was previously assumed. Nobody really knows if this is right, or just an artifact of not knowing how to do the calculations correctly.
Find free books.
I was talking to a very smart friend of mine who was feeling depressed. He said "Now that religion is proven null and void, I don't know what to live for - what is the meaning of life?", my answer, the one which fills a hole for me in a way, is to fight entropy. Maybe the most noble of all future human ventres, will be to fight entropy. I have a feeling only intelligent life can do it. That made him feel better.
Can someone explain why black holes contain the majority of the entropy in the universe? Singularities would not seem to contain so much randomness. thx.
Someone has figured out my plan. Don't worry it's all under control.
Entropy just isn't what it used to be.
Scientific American just had an article about a theory that quantum effects would stop a Black Hole from actually forming, instead it'd be a Black Star. Interesting read, even if I'm not a cosmologist.
...Science is agnostic (because it deals with the natural, not with any kind of potential "supernatural"),....
Indeed, is there any mathematical equation or law of physics that operates differently if God is honored as creator, rather than some other mechanisms that leave God out of the picture? All scientific facts and data are neutral. It is only people's interpretation of the data, that may or may not give God the credit and honor.
Faith goes where science cannot go, because unlike science, faith is not limited to the natural, but indeed CAN go to the supernatural. In the end, faith is more important in all of our lives, then we give it credit for. I'm not talking about blind faith, but reasoned faith. Jehovah God invites us to reason:
Isa 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, says Jehovah; though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be like wool.
There is very little in life, if anything, that we know for certain. It's reasonable to believe, that you,ll wake up tomorrow morning to another day, but it's by no means certain. It's reasonable to believe, that the airplane you're about to get into, will take you to your destination. Sometimes airplanes crash killing everybody aboard. It's reasonable to believe, hope, that other drivers will be sober, keeping on their side of the road, but we all know, that some get drunk and cause deadly crashes. It is reasonable for me to believe in God, whom I have repeatedly seen working in my and my family's life.
All theory is gray
The real world is curled into 10^33. The spooky side. Hologram we live in. God exists, you have someone to answer to. Deal with it already.
there was chaos. Now measurements confirm that there is more chaos. Why should I worry about the chaos on my desk ?!?
'Hilarious' is you creating more entropy with that post than most people do in an entire lifetime. You have an incomplete understanding of entropy as well as singularities. Including, not least of all, the English language. Anything that removes usable, ordered energy from the universe, contributes to entropy. Entropy is a decrease in something else, not an entity in its own right. You treat it like phlogiston. Heat is not the absence of cold. Cold is the absence of heat. As far as we know NOW, ordered matter and ordered energy tied up in a black hole are effectively unavailable. If it would cost more to extract them from a black hole than what we could extract from them after being extracted from the black hole, entropy is increased. Check your rectal entropy thermometer to make sure.
"People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything."
except it is not finite. it get to amximun entropy, but it continues to exist, forever.
It's noce that you create your own belief in the face of all actual evidence, but it's a bit of a mastabatory practice, don't you think?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Never heard of local chairmen of Atheist societies, but if it is so easy to check, why not give us one example?
Hint: There's a difference between a logical argument and an argument about physical reality. I did the former. That is, I didn't say anything about whether the universe had a beginning, I only said something about whether we can conclude that it had a beginning from it having a finite age. Namely we can't.
About physical reality, it's to expect that GR will fail before approaching the singularity. But that's clear not from the fact that there's a singularity (after all, one could imagine ways to avoid the singularity without modifying GR; probably some well-crafted assumptions about dark energy would suffice), but from the simple fact that GR and QM simply do not fit together well, but would both become relevant in the very early universe. And it's extremely unlikely that this would be resolved by a modification of just QM (although I'd not be surprised if QM had to be modified as well as GR).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.