4 ms·
> is there any real practical use for them? An infinite source of power. Place one wormhole at the top of a hill, another at the bottom. Send rolling generator
by teeray 5y ago
> is there any real practical use for them?
An infinite source of power. Place one wormhole at the top of a hill, another at the bottom. Send rolling generators through them, stop them once in awhile to swap dead batteries for charged ones.
- ben_w 5y agoI suspect that (if wormholes can actually be made) gravitational potential would be smooth throughout, and that you’d be pulled up as much while falling out of the top as you get pulled down while approaching the bottom.
- ars 5y agoKeep in mind you can not create or destroy gravitational potential - you can only move it. Otherwise you have a discontinuity. So you would have to start your wormhole with both mouths at the same place, and then move one mouth to the new location, with gravity "flowing" between them all the while.
- ben_w 5y agoThe word “flowing” is ambiguous, I don’t know if you’re agreeing with me or disagreeing with me.
- ars 5y agoA change in gravitational potential (because you moved a mass) flows through normal space. It would do the same through the wormhole. So I'm agreeing with you, and adding how this gravitational slope is created: It's created at the start of the wormhole and changes as you move the mouths of the wormhole, rather than popping into existence at a later time with the two wormhole mouths separated.
- teekert 5y agoSomething tells me the wormhole also costs energy.
- JPLeRouzic 5y agoOr the wormhole will eat the place of the proposed experimentation?
- teeray 5y agoCould you power the wormhole with its own energy output? Or would that mean the wormhole requires infinite energy to resolve the conundrum?
- krapp 5y agoYou can't resolve the conundrum. You can't have perfect efficiency or free energy. The laws of thermodynamics can't be cheated. No matter what you do, you will get less work from the system than the energy you put in, and eventually entropy will eat everything. It doesn't matter if it works on paper, we don't live on paper.
- LadyCailin 5y agoContinuing the hypothetical, seems like a hydroelectric station would be easier and more consistent.