-thanks.

it’s funny how the story behind this has grown… but i suppose he was only trying to protect himself… after all I’ve been watched ever since. My intelligence robbed me of my childhood, and the truth always proves to be depressing.
I was only 16.

J.M.G.
8/2/1982

funny stuff

Enjoy it for what it is. Who cares if it’s fake or real, how old it is? It’s a funny article. Loosen up. Live life.

shut up.

poop.

Or as Einstein’s law states, energy is mass and vice versa, so maybe once the souls reach hell, for the entities to “exist” in hell it converts back into some kind of a mass from the energy state that it was before.

That’s my nerdy theory based on what I know about E=mc2 etc. Cheers

First off, the question doesn’t make sense. Endergonic and exergonic
(aka endothermic and exothermic) as terms imply closed or open volumes,
meaning that energy can be transferred in or out, but not isolated, which means that no mass or energy leaves. The kid’s explanation clearly implies a belief that hell is clearly functionally isolated. At any given time t, hell is an isolated system and does not exchange anything with its surroundings.

The citation of Boyle’s Law by both the “usual answers” provided and the student (I’m wondering why it was even mentioned, since the full ideal gas law is a generalization of Boyle’s law and should be used in its place in a college course) are wrong. What the question refers to as “Boyle’s Law” is in fact Charles’ Law. What the student refers to is the so-called “combined” gas law. The empirical thermodynamic laws are:

P=kT (constant volume) [Charles’ Law]
V=kT (constant pressure) [Guy-Lussac’s Law]
PV=k (constant temperature) [Boyle’s Law]

Where k of course represents a different constant in each case. The
combined gas law is:

PV=kT (isolated system)

Each of the above laws is in fact an artifact of the early days of chemical thermodynamics, when each of these laws was discovered empirically. An empirical law isn’t really explaining anything, just saying that there’s a correlation. To truly understand something, you have to start with a set of axioms and derive a general formula for it, something that these laws didn’t do.

Later on, the kinetic molecular theory derived from statistical mechanics a generalized ideal gas law that encompasses all of the above:

PV=nRT, where R is the ideal gas constant, 0.08206 L*atm*K^(-1)*mol^(-1), and n is the number of molecules.

Furthermore, following this kid’s reasoning, just from a logical standpoint, Hell’s temperature and pressure are constant, therefore
volume has to change, therefore Hell will eventually experience a temperature change. I missed the logic train. While his explanation is funny, I would like to think any university professor has a better set of brains in his head than this one allegedly displayed.

And even though as stated above, the question doesn’t make any amount of sense, just for the sake of amusement, I can give a correct
thermodynamic explanation of Hell.

Since the kid pretty clearly established that Hell is a semi-isolated
system in which merely has a positive input of souls, then we can say that by definition, dU/dt_(n)=0, or the change in internal energy of
Hell is constant given no change in the number of souls. Then the internal energy of Hell is at least constant, if not increasing, since
things can only enter it. I suppose we can expect it to be increasing since for it to be constant, every entering soul would have to be a point volume and be at absolute zero.

If we assume that we can represent Hell as a homogeneous nonreacting gaseous system (i.e. all chemical potentials of the various souls are 0), then the internal energy of Hell U = PV; that is, is equivalent to the amount of work being done by pressure on the “walls” of Hell.

Further, we must note that in Hell, temperature (a measure of the
kinetic energy of particles) is a factor.

The ideal gas law PV = nRT predicts that if n increases, and since we
know PV is increasing, this all really depends on this expression:

p*dV/dt + V*dP/dt = RT*dn\dt + Rn*dT/dt

Which is a description of the ideal gas law as time goes by. This expression shows that since we know dn/dt > 0 (souls are being added), then one of three things will happen depending on temperature:

1. If temperature increases, then the product of volume and pressure
will as well. The pressure might increase radically and the volume decrease, vice versa, or they both might increase to a certain degree.

2. If temperature is constant, then the same will definitely happen.

3. If temperature decreases, then it means that the product of volume
and pressure will increase to a degree that exceeds the capacity to retain the same temperature. It’s like what happens when you bring a
rubber band back to its natural state after letting it be stretched for a bit. The band has done so much work on its environment (typically your fingers, by helping bring them together) and is unable to transfer heat, so it becomes cold. Similarly, Hell will do work on its “surroundings” to the point where it becomes colder, on average, than it was before.

So in short, if it’s a cold day in Hell, it means that this particular college student had just observed evidence of Hell getting a lot bigger or a lot more crowded a lot faster than usual. That’s what you get for an incorrect answer. God smites you with the power of SCIENCE!

God I love thermodynamics.

Having a blog does not raise you above those who don’t.

peace. live life.

That’s the problem people have.

Enjoy, and enjoy.

I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you….

btw… I want the tart in the car ad! I’ll branding iron that check mark on her butt cheeks!
(ok…OK! I’ll use a marker! What’s with you people anyway?!?)

No matter how old this is, it’s still funny the first time you read it.

Quit ruining it bastards.