Entropy and Gravity
March 18, 2008 by gbrown · Leave a Comment
Newton’s aporcaphyl tale of the apple is widely known yet rarely understood. The apple never fell from the tree rather Newton sat from afar and compared the size of the apple to thar of the moon in the sky. What he concluded laid the foundations for what we now understand to be gravity.
And that’s about as much as we know. That it exists but in what form it operates we have advanced little beyond Newton’s initial observations.
Perhaps the best cosmological conjectures compare the machinations of gravity to the curvature of space. Space, it appears, is not linear but curved. Place a heavy object such as a bowling ball on a mattress and try rolling a marble across. What you find is the marble follows the contours and eventually moves in towards the bowling ball just as a meteorite would approaching the Earth under the influence of gravity.
There’s plenty more on that subject but before we discuss 10 dimensional multiverses let’s adjourn to terra firma. What we do know about gravity in our more mortal existences is that it provides resistance. Without gravity, we could not fly, because as Newton would concur forces exert equal reactions. Similalry without resistance we would experience a world like walking on ice, only far more slippy.
To fly birds need to beat their wings. As human beings we also face the choice of a life grounded or a life of opportunity. Unfortunately for many the latter requires too much resistance and too much flapping.
In his book simply titled “Goals” Zig Ziglar says that daily renewal whether it be through reading or exercise is essential not just for growth but for not regressing. We often dismiss the value of such activities because their impact is felt only when we do them every day. Yet as a society we don’t dismiss the need for washing, bathing or eating every day even though their effects are short lived.
In his excellent book “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” Stephen Covey relates the final 7th habit - Sharpening the Saw - to the little understood discipline of thermodynamics. We all understand the concept that energy creates heat. Any matter, however, over time will lose heat due to the impact of entropy. I.e. Left to itself matter will simply decompose to its consituent parts.
And so do we. Without regular training or “sharpening of the saw” we lose our edge. If we aren’t spending at least an hour a day in renewing activities such as reading, writing a diary or blog, excercise, listening to audio CDs etc we are prone to entropy.
Yes it’s so much easier to watch the TV after a hard day’s work but then it’s successful people who someone manage to dig deep and find the time, motivation and discipline to turn up at the gym, read that book or write that blog when you were on the couch at home. Whilst you were down the pub they were preparing for the future.
And these small investments are often overlooked when people put the success of others down to “getting lucky”.
So without launching into a universal theory of everything (we already have String Theory for what it’s worth), we can see parallels between the vast expanses that is the Universe and our more humbled individual existence.
Both it seems if lest to their own devices will end in entropy. In his book “Parallel Worlds” Michio Kaku describes the “end of the Universe” as a scenario in which energy finally runs out and we reach absolute zero (or -273c). Fortunately for us we have another 30 billion years before that’ll happen. On a more pressing level however, it happens to our own personal universes every day.
Gravity, it appears, is often other people and getting ahead requires exerting a force greater than the immediate pull of peer group need.
