From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Mon Jan 31 2000 - 19:18:18 MST
Hey, just because a process is thermodynamically reversible doesn't mean
that you can't get any work out of it; it just means that the energy has
to be moved from an existing reservoir rather than generated by
equalizing temperature differentials.
Maybe this device drains the binding energy of the Universe and converts
it to AC electrical power, while plugging the device into a wall socket
causes the Universe to expand faster. That'd be reversible, right?
The question that occurs to me is whether this draining/pumping of the
cosmological constant has a propagation limited by the lightspeed limit,
and, if so, whether this device might drain all the cosmic glue out of
the Solar System in thirty seconds. (Shades of Asimov!)
--
sentience@pobox.com Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
http://pobox.com/~sentience/beyond.html
Typing in Dvorak Programming with Patterns Writing in Gender-neutral
Voting for Libertarians Heading for Singularity There Is A Better Way
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