🚀 go-pugleaf

On Apr 12, 1:17 pm, Pentcho Valev <pva...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> http://focus.aps.org/story/v23/st10
> "In collisions between two deformable or sticky objects, some or all
> of the initial energy is usually lost to heat. But computer
> simulations of nanocluster collisions, as described in the March
> Physical Review E, show that thermal fluctuations in the tiny
> projectiles can cause them to rebound with more kinetic energy than
> they started with. This energy boost would seem to violate the second
> law of thermodynamics, which bans heat from being turned directly into
> energy of motion. (...) The fraction of these anomalous rebounds
> increased with the cluster temperature. "When the temperature
> increases, more and more vibrating modes are excited," Kuninaka says.
> These vibrations can sometimes give an extra kick to the collision,
> like a gymnast pushing off the pummel horse to get a greater lift. The
> transfer of energy from random internal motion of the atoms to the
> movement of the whole cluster creates a decrease in entropy and
> therefore an apparent violation of the second law of thermodynamics.
> But that's OK at small scales."
>
> That's OK at large scales as well, as demonstrated by macroscopic
> contractile polymers:
>
> http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jp972167t
> J. Phys. Chem. B, 1997, 101 (51), pp 11007–11028
> Dan W. Urry, "Physical Chemistry of Biological Free Energy
> Transduction As Demonstrated by Elastic Protein-Based Polymers"
>
> As far as I know, the only paper explaining (or trying to explain) how
> biased thermal motion can phenomenologically be expressed as violation
> of the second law of thermodynamics is this one:
>
> http://www.wbabin.net/valev/valev2.htm

People expressing views that conflict with conventional wisdom are
normally ignored, ridiculed or attacked but in the cases of the second
law of thermodynamics and Einstein's 1905 false light postulate
additional measures had to be taken by the establishment. Official
"mavericks" have been introduced - individuals who know both how to
challenge the false fundamental principle without challenging it and
how to extract career and money from the campaign:

http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=5538
Paul Davies: "Was Einstein wrong? Einstein's famous equation E=mc2 is
the only scientific formula known to just about everyone. The "c" here
stands for the speed of light. It is one of the most fundamental of
the basic constants of physics. Or is it? In recent years a few
maverick scientists have claimed that the speed of light might not be
constant at all. Shock, horror! Does this mean the next Great
Revolution in Science is just around the corner?"

In thermodynamics the "maverick" who leads the red herring campaign is
Daniel Sheehan:

http://www.energyfromthevacuum.com/Disc8/
"CHALLENGING THE SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS with Professor DANIEL
SHEEHAN PhD Physics Department University of San Diego
"In this DVD, University of San Diego physics professor Dr. Daniel
Sheehan who co-hosted the two conferences, gives us a tour of the
field as seen through the mainstream eyes of an honest seeker of the
truth.  A dynamic, fascinating and entertaining speaker, he shows that
all is not well with the concept of the inviolability of the second
law."

In relativity the respective "maverick" is, of course, the ubiquitous
Joao Magueijo:

http://www.amazon.com/Faster-Than-Speed-Light-Speculation/dp/0738205257
Joao Magueijo: "I am by profession a theoretical physicist. By every
definition I am a fully credentialed scholar-graduate work and Ph.D.
at Cambridge, followed by a very prestigious research fellowship at
St. John's College, Cambridge (Paul Dirac and Abdus Salam formerly
held this fellowship), then a Royal Society research fellow. Now I'm a
lecturer (the equivalent of a tenured professor in the United States)
at Imperial College. (...) A missile fired from a plane moves faster
than one fired from the ground because the plane's speed adds to the
missile's speed. If I throw something forward on a moving train, its
speed with respect to the platform is the speed of that object plus
that of the train. You might think that the same should happen to
light: Light flashed from a train should travel faster. However, what
the Michelson-Morley experiments showed was that this was not the
case: Light always moves stubbornly at the same speed. This means that
if I take a light ray and ask several observers moving with respect to
each other to measure the speed of this light ray, they will all agree
on the same apparent speed!"

Official "mavericks" manage to camouflage the presence of genuine
criticism and so science just dies without the world noticing its
death:

http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000313/
Jos Uffink: "In the eyes of many modern physicists, the theory has
acquired a somewhat dubious status. They regard classical
thermodynamics as a relic from a bygone era... Indeed, the view that
thermodynamics is obsolete is so common that many physicists use the
phrase 'Second Law of Thermodynamics' to denote some counterpart of
this law in the kinetic theory of gases or in statistical mechanics."

Relativity's death is relatively recent but in 10-20 years another
"Jos Uffink" may find it suitable to write:

"In the eyes of many modern physicists, the theory has acquired a
somewhat dubious status. They regard relativity as a relic from a
bygone era... Indeed, the view that relativity is obsolete is so
common that many physicists use the phrase 'Constancy of the Speed of
Light' to denote a definition adopted at the 1983 Conference Generale
des Poids et Mesures."

Pentcho Valev
pvalev@yahoo.com