Abstract
What would happen to a volume of gas, which was left to expand in a sealed container without the interference of a demon? If a perfume bottle was placed in a sealed container and then opened, the molecules would spread throughout the available volume.
If seconds were counted without clock, according to a certain feeling, the big question is whether these seconds would all be equal at one time or another.
Lichtenberg, Sudelbücher II, Goldpapierheft: §34; translated by the author
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Notes
- 1.
This Demon is based on J. Loschmidt’s reversibility objection to Boltzmann’s deterministic understanding of the Second law. The context of Loschmidt’s objection is the 19th century concern about the eventual heat death of the universe. Note that Loschmidt generalizes from a sealed container to the whole universe (Loschmidt 1876: 139).
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Weinert, F. (2016). Loschmidt’s Demon: Reversibility and Irreversibility. In: The Demons of Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31708-3_16
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31708-3_16
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