6 ms·

Cool story. Did you have an actual explained mechanism by which this is going to happen? Because if you're saying "exactly zero and close to it," we've never

Cool story. Did you have an actual explained mechanism by which this is going to happen? Because if you're saying "exactly zero and close to it," we've never actually had a single atom at exactly zero, let alone a macroscopic object

aeternum 5y ago
We can get close enough to absolute zero that very weird quantum effects being to happen which one could argue are associated with information loss. Cooper pairs is one such example, where at very low temperatures electrons pair up and begin to behave like a new combined particle with integer spin. Thus they morph from fermions to bosons which are no longer subject to pauli exclusion and can all occupy the same state. The information required to describe such a system decreases substantially as the potential state space is now quite limited. This manifests in physical phenomenon like superconductivity and superfluidity.
- JohnHaugeland 5y ago
  We cannot do these things macroscopically, no. I will repeat my protest which you ignored from the previous comment. 1) We have never reduced even a single atom to absolute zero. Practicioners debate whether it's actually possible. 2) Your discussion of bose-einstein condensates is neat and all, but the explicit context is a hard drive. Nobody has ever condensed a macroscopic object (the breathless article about condensing a tardigrade isn't actually correct.) There has never been a superfluid or superconductive hard drive. Please focus on the question being asked, in the context being asked, if you must reply. How do you propose to reduce a hard drive to actual non-almost zero degrees? Not a few particles, not electron pairs. A hard drive. Once it's at absolute zero, formally, so what? Yes, I saw you guys handwaving "spooky stuff happens," but in reality, we've had hard drives within a tenth of a degree kelvin and nothing happened. If you're going to propose effects, please have a specific mechanism in hand that creates the specific effects asked about, in a context that is the hard drive and not two electrons Thanks
  - aeternum 5y ago
    The CERN CMS magnet is a 10,000 ton superconductor. 6-meter diameter and 13-meters long. For the vast majority of materials (of any size), strange things do happen when you hit the critical temperature. You can take any amount of mercury for example and when it hits 4.1 K it loses all its electrical resistance. Hard drives are not the only items that can contain information.
    - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
      A third time: 1. We've had hard drives within a tenth of a degree of kelvin, and the effect you're asserting did not occur 2. You're offering no explanation for what would actually cause this 3. The weight of a random superconductor is an irrelevant detail added for fake technical acumen We have had these devices at these temperatures, and the thing you're talking about did not occur. Until you can say why it would, there is no reason to take this seriously. We've already done this. Your speculation is invalidated by experience and data.
satokausi 5y ago
You seem very arrogant discussing things that are purely theoretical (absolute zero objects). A healthy debate includes space for speculation, and you are shooting this speculation down with arguments like ”it just doesn’t work like that”, which does not bring anything to the discussion.
- JohnHaugeland 5y ago
  Sure, sure. And I speculate a wizard did it. When people are speculating that effects will happen, even though we've done this and they didn't, by asserting that an impossible goal wasn't reached, it's appropriate to ask them how. If you feel that it's appropriate to use emotive words like "arrogant" when someone says "please tell me how that's possible," then I guess I'm not that worried about your opinion.
rcxdude 5y ago
Indeed, it's a purely theoretical scenario, and I don't think anyone is claiming otherwise: the paper simply notes that one consequence of the theory is that information cannot exist at absolute zero, and then someone who considers this weird questions what would happen to an object storing data were this to happen. Your response was 'nothing, because data storage on space probes still works', which is a non-sequitar: the theory does not predict that data storage at space temperatures will cease to hold information. But one specific mechanism exists: at a certain point there's entropy in simply the structure of the macroscopic object which prevents lowering its temperature further. So if you were to cool it as close to absolute zero as possible it would require turning it into something which was not a hard drive (again, this is something would occur far below the current achieved temperatures with even microscopic objects).
- JohnHaugeland 5y ago
  > Indeed, it's a purely theoretical scenario Theory says that this scenario cannot occur, so it's actually not a theoretical scenario. Temperature is defined as the brownian net motion of a bag of particles. No reference point is involved. How do you make that zero temperature? Are these particles zero-motion with respect to themselves? Then they aren't with respect to the planet, or the sun, or the galaxy. Are they zero-motion with respect to the sun? Then they're hot enough to melt in seconds. The conceptual idea of zero-temperature is not a real thing. These people doing their fake-wise "but weird things happen at zero temperature" are just snake oil salesmen plying false knowledge. There is no such thing as zero temperature. In the meantime, there's nothing theoretical about the practical scenario, either. Voyager's hard drives have been in the absolute zero of outer space for more than half a century. Its heater, which did not reach the hard drives, has been off for more than a decade. Those hard drives have been sub-1-kelvin for years and nothing changed. These people are trying to speculate about what would happen if in a situation we've already had a dozen times, because they don't know the truth, and are filling their lack of knowledge with guesswork. When it's presented to them that facts exist, they attempt to move the goalpost to theoretical limits which physics says aren't actually real at all, and then from there try to lean on their depth in physics. . > So if you were to cool it as close to absolute zero as possible it would require turning it into something which was not a hard drive This is a fantastic point, and something I hadn't even thought of. I like this a lot. I'm still wondering about "what, you think ball bearings in a vacuum don't work when it's chilly?" Like I can't even think of why they think it'll fail, except some magical belief that the fact that it's cold just causes magical breakage The operation of the damn drive is friction based. It'll heat up! Crimeny.

aeternum 5y ago

We can get close enough to absolute zero that very weird quantum effects being to happen which one could argue are associated with information loss. Cooper pairs is one such example, where at very low temperatures electrons pair up and begin to behave like a new combined particle with integer spin. Thus they morph from fermions to bosons which are no longer subject to pauli exclusion and can all occupy the same state. The information required to describe such a system decreases substantially as the potential state space is now quite limited. This manifests in physical phenomenon like superconductivity and superfluidity.

JohnHaugeland 5y ago
We cannot do these things macroscopically, no. I will repeat my protest which you ignored from the previous comment. 1) We have never reduced even a single atom to absolute zero. Practicioners debate whether it's actually possible. 2) Your discussion of bose-einstein condensates is neat and all, but the explicit context is a hard drive. Nobody has ever condensed a macroscopic object (the breathless article about condensing a tardigrade isn't actually correct.) There has never been a superfluid or superconductive hard drive. Please focus on the question being asked, in the context being asked, if you must reply. How do you propose to reduce a hard drive to actual non-almost zero degrees? Not a few particles, not electron pairs. A hard drive. Once it's at absolute zero, formally, so what? Yes, I saw you guys handwaving "spooky stuff happens," but in reality, we've had hard drives within a tenth of a degree kelvin and nothing happened. If you're going to propose effects, please have a specific mechanism in hand that creates the specific effects asked about, in a context that is the hard drive and not two electrons Thanks
- aeternum 5y ago
  The CERN CMS magnet is a 10,000 ton superconductor. 6-meter diameter and 13-meters long. For the vast majority of materials (of any size), strange things do happen when you hit the critical temperature. You can take any amount of mercury for example and when it hits 4.1 K it loses all its electrical resistance. Hard drives are not the only items that can contain information.
  - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
    A third time: 1. We've had hard drives within a tenth of a degree of kelvin, and the effect you're asserting did not occur 2. You're offering no explanation for what would actually cause this 3. The weight of a random superconductor is an irrelevant detail added for fake technical acumen We have had these devices at these temperatures, and the thing you're talking about did not occur. Until you can say why it would, there is no reason to take this seriously. We've already done this. Your speculation is invalidated by experience and data.

satokausi 5y ago

You seem very arrogant discussing things that are purely theoretical (absolute zero objects). A healthy debate includes space for speculation, and you are shooting this speculation down with arguments like ”it just doesn’t work like that”, which does not bring anything to the discussion.

JohnHaugeland 5y ago
Sure, sure. And I speculate a wizard did it. When people are speculating that effects will happen, even though we've done this and they didn't, by asserting that an impossible goal wasn't reached, it's appropriate to ask them how. If you feel that it's appropriate to use emotive words like "arrogant" when someone says "please tell me how that's possible," then I guess I'm not that worried about your opinion.

rcxdude 5y ago

Indeed, it's a purely theoretical scenario, and I don't think anyone is claiming otherwise: the paper simply notes that one consequence of the theory is that information cannot exist at absolute zero, and then someone who considers this weird questions what would happen to an object storing data were this to happen. Your response was 'nothing, because data storage on space probes still works', which is a non-sequitar: the theory does not predict that data storage at space temperatures will cease to hold information. But one specific mechanism exists: at a certain point there's entropy in simply the structure of the macroscopic object which prevents lowering its temperature further. So if you were to cool it as close to absolute zero as possible it would require turning it into something which was not a hard drive (again, this is something would occur far below the current achieved temperatures with even microscopic objects).

JohnHaugeland 5y ago
> Indeed, it's a purely theoretical scenario Theory says that this scenario cannot occur, so it's actually not a theoretical scenario. Temperature is defined as the brownian net motion of a bag of particles. No reference point is involved. How do you make that zero temperature? Are these particles zero-motion with respect to themselves? Then they aren't with respect to the planet, or the sun, or the galaxy. Are they zero-motion with respect to the sun? Then they're hot enough to melt in seconds. The conceptual idea of zero-temperature is not a real thing. These people doing their fake-wise "but weird things happen at zero temperature" are just snake oil salesmen plying false knowledge. There is no such thing as zero temperature. In the meantime, there's nothing theoretical about the practical scenario, either. Voyager's hard drives have been in the absolute zero of outer space for more than half a century. Its heater, which did not reach the hard drives, has been off for more than a decade. Those hard drives have been sub-1-kelvin for years and nothing changed. These people are trying to speculate about what would happen if in a situation we've already had a dozen times, because they don't know the truth, and are filling their lack of knowledge with guesswork. When it's presented to them that facts exist, they attempt to move the goalpost to theoretical limits which physics says aren't actually real at all, and then from there try to lean on their depth in physics. . > So if you were to cool it as close to absolute zero as possible it would require turning it into something which was not a hard drive This is a fantastic point, and something I hadn't even thought of. I like this a lot. I'm still wondering about "what, you think ball bearings in a vacuum don't work when it's chilly?" Like I can't even think of why they think it'll fail, except some magical belief that the fact that it's cold just causes magical breakage The operation of the damn drive is friction based. It'll heat up! Crimeny.