Eternal recurrence and the morality of fierce competition

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Also, this isn't to say that I don't believe in entropy. Just: I think the second law of thermodynamics is a very poor interpretation of entropy...relative to my stating that by my putting my fist through someone's nose, that energy is transfered and converted into aural energy that manifests as a noise that exit's the receiving party's mouth. It's true so long as you keep within certain parameters.

edit: interesting point is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell%27 ... evelopment

Not because it proves my point so much as it completely redefines what entropy is and therefore with a different definition, allows the law to remain. Particularly the point proposed by Leó Szilárd and Léon Brillouin. Second law holds a little better with this broader definition. Looking at the whole of something always makes a difference. So then how would entropy create the pre-big bang conditions? I have a couple ideas which would actually somewhat fit the second law but also require a vast breaking of it in the most basic understanding of it.

Okay, before this hall of mirrors of a debate continues, I must mention that eternal recurrence has almost nothing to do with the second law of thermodynamics. What it means is that after the universe ends in heat death, another universe is born just like ours in which we live our lives all over again. Get it? We're immortal!

At least we are if eternal recurrence is real. Like I said, it's an obscure concept that must be handled with care.

So... can I truly learn to appreciate the value of others' fulfillment? When I see a boy and girl together, can I learn not to get jealous or fear being trapped inside of 'me' for the rest of eternity?

Oh, I just thought of a neat idea. Maybe if we only look at ourselves as particular people, the kind of people who might be eternally reborn as only one person, that implies looking at this universe as a particular universe. Since the expansion of the universe is accelerating, that might mean that one encounters the heat death as a mode of preservation from the hells of eternal recurrence.

It seems to me, however, that if this were the case, then our consciousness would need to 'continue' past the heat death and be painless, to prevent the anthropic principle from kicking in and forcing us to realize our consciousness in some other universe.

Gosh, it sure is hard to be single.

If you didn't notice it how do you know it?

ruveyn

Because I'm special...

I also want to let you know that this is, to me, a very serious subject...

The entropy don't necessery mean the heat-death of the universe. The universe expansion "dilute" the entropy, it's a little like trying to fill up of water a bucket who continue to get bigger and bigger.

This might clarify your thinking.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_death_of_the_universe

That relies on the universe being finite.

And your delight in an infinite universe does not create it. The admission on your part of the big bang creation of the universe which is documented in several ways definitely implies a limited universe since an infinite universe cannot have a beginning.

I'll bite: Why can't an infinite universe have a beginning?

Because it would have to be created instantaneously of infinite size and not expand through time and space as we are witnessing it doing.

The universe is not expanding through time and space; space and time are expanding.

I seem to have brought up >>>this little ditty<<< (brought to you by UCLA) a few times now. From what I've gathered, the question of the finitude of the universe is nontrivial, contrary to popular belief.

Well, that does not seem like a reason why it couldn't happen, only like a reason why the existence of an infinite universe would not make sense by our theories on the matter. However, if one only accepts the big bang as a local matter, then one can accept a universe that is infinite.

However, I would generally say that an infinite universe would not prevent heat death. If the aspects of the universe were so close together that they would heat each other, then perhaps heat death wouldn't occur, however, if we look at our own universe, it is apparent that the night sky is not literally just full of light, meaning that if we assume an infinite universe that electromagnetic waves that have had billions upon billions of years to reach us are still too far away. Given this, it seems likely that a heat death will occur simply because with all of this volume and an amount of energy that seems significantly smaller, the ultimate temperature of the universe will be too low to carry out substantive chemical reactions.

At least, if we aren't assuming that our infinite universe is infinitely growing, however, the issue then is that this assumption would have to assume that *large* amounts of matter are emerging unnoticed.

The distinction seems irrelevant, as the point Sand is making that an infinite amount of material cannot meaningfully exist in a finite amount of space, which we would have to have unless the change from finite space to infinite space was instantaneous, meaning we would have an odd discontinuity within the growth of the universe.

@Sand: You're right I did Confuse some of the concepts. But still, as long the that clouds of hydrogen form new stars and that the universe cold itself by expanding, there wil be no heat death. (Depending of the fate of the universe, it can be a very long time.)
By the way, the universe being infinite or not got no influence on this mater, as on large scales the Universe is the same everywhere.

No, as the stars lit themselfs by nuclear reactions. The heat for starting this reactions come from their birth. The stars births when vast hydrogen clouds conglomerates under his gravity, heating itsel in the process to maintain entropy.



About one hydrogen atom by litre by billion of years (I got that from a book)

Let's not forget the "coolest" consequence of a infinite universe. The universe being infinite, everything, not matter how small the odds, will come true in a infinite number of times and places. Which mean Somewhere in space, this may all be happening right now (If the laws of the universe authorise that, of course )

Right, but there is a small (mass/energy)/volume ratio, meaning that this is unlikely to happen.


I am not sure where the number came from, however, I will admit that my assumption was a bit of a guess as I assumed that a significant amount of mass and energy were dissipating off to the void due to solar reactions and things like that. But yeah, I suppose in the very very long run, we can have a big crunch.