4 ms·
I think the author pretty clearly explained the connection: the arrow of time does not seem to follow from the underlying laws of physics, which work t
by arh68 13y ago
I think the author pretty clearly explained the connection:
the arrow of time does not seem to follow from the underlying
laws of physics, which work the same going forward in time as in
reverse. By those laws, it seemed that if someone knew the paths
of all the particles in the universe and flipped them around,
energy would accumulate rather than disperse: Tepid coffee would
spontaneously heat up
What he's saying is a bit unclear: we know the how, which is even a kind of plausible explanation as to why. What the author says we couldn't explain before is the converse: why does the opposite never happen? So I interpret that quote more like "Finally, we can understand why a cup of coffee only equilibriates..."
- TTPrograms 13y agoStatistical mechanics doesn't say why a coffee cup never heats up spontaneously - rather, it says that the probability of that happening is incredibly small. You end up with probabilities like 10^-100000. This doesn't require quantum at all, and is effectively the same.
- judk 13y agoTwo objects always attract under gravity, never repel under gravity. Why is this less mysterious than thermodynamic equilibrium, which is some sense just an opposite of gravity (repulsive instead of attractive)?