MigL

The meaning of the term 'superpower' has not changed; it is a relative term. The ambition, intent and methods used by the leaders of that 'superpower' is what's changed. The US has been making itself safe for the last century by being fair with its allies, and resolute with its enemies. Now it seeks to subjugate allies, and kiss-up to enemies; all for personal glory, and brazen greed. Nobody, except D Trump, his administration, and MAGA, expected that to work out well.

Sometimes I wish I was smart enough to understand you ... Sadly, I never have. Closest I ever got was a day trip to Tunis, while spending a few days in western Sicily. But that's half a continent away.

You're giving away your age Studiot; Sensei may be young enough to be unaware of a slide rule. ( unless he watched Apollo 13, and saw Tom Hanks using one ) If you have to drive a screw into the wall, and you choose a hammer instead of a screwdriver from your toolbox , are you going to blame the hammer when the plaster or drywall cracks ? Choose the proper tool; never ask a question in AI Overview.

If you go back to my 3rd post on the 1st page of this thread, @studiot , you will read me stating the same thing. All motion cannot cease; it is still, after all, a Quantum system, and quantum Uncertainty has to be obeyed ( even that far in the future, and maybe only fundamental particles ); energy and time in particular, meaning time is still needed. By maximal entropy, @sethoflagos , I mean the largest entropy available to the system at that time in the future. And I propose that there will be no degrees of freedom, or independent states, that will be available for the system to occupy, at that time in the far future, as proton decay might be the very last source of available free energy, at that time. Can you suggest another source of free energy, in that far future, that will keep processes going ? As to whether this is equivalent to Maxwell Entropy, I'm not sure. ( Statistical Thermodynamics was hard enough without memorizing definitions )

I'm afraid you may have misinterpreted what I'm insisting. I'm insisting that these energy states that the hadrons of the Earth could be redistributed in, are simply not available states, because the hadrons would require an input of energy to move to those infinitely many states. Consider a book with 1000 pages. There are many more ways to arrange the pages of that book so that they are not in order, than the one way in which they are ordered. Yet when the book is 'bound', only the ordered state is available; to access the other state you need to supply energy, and rip out all the pages. That is correct. I am of the opinion that 'heat death' of the universe would imply maximal entropy, as there is no more useable energy. ( also, the thread was split after the fact, due to my mention of entropy with respect to time ) If you need to start introducing infinities ... But if you consider an actual system, even one as improbable as the causal, observable universe, parts of it are continuously moving out of that causal frame, and the 'spacing' of the frame is getting stretched by inflation. Energy and mass are leaving the causal universe and radiation is stretching to longer wavelengths. Now give it a Billion, Billion, Billion, Billion years. What would happen to your infinite sea with infinite atmosphere if it had a causal boundary like the universe does ?

The ultimate bound state is a Black Hole. BHs do not lower entropy; information is 'stored' in Planck-sized domains on the surface of the Event Horizon, in accordance to the Bekenstein-Hawking relation. It is this dynamic equilibrium ( making Studiot happy ) that accounts for BHs having a characteristic temperature, and therefore, black body ( Hawking ) radiation, as there is a flux through the surface of the EH. The 'final' equilibrium is when the BH evaporates. Similarly, should protons decay into fundamental particles, so will neutrons as they have nothing to keep them happy in nucleii. So no atoms. Yeah, no transistor radios at the end of the universe.

Sooo ... A very large ( and increasing in the case of 'learning' )number of optimized responses, coupled with a web search process. Certainly 'Artificial', but not what I would label "Intelligence". ( nice 'breakdown', by the way Sensei )

V'ger and Nomad ( from Star Trek ) beg to differ ...

Why are we even talking about maximal entropy systems where there is a source of useable energy ? It doesn't happen because the core provides energy ( radiative heat ) causing motion due to differential heating. What does happen in a 'dead' asteroid is stratification according to density. That's exactly how gravity works. Are we not discussing maximal entropy, as in the 'heat death' of the universe ? A system in a state without flux of energy through its boundary, that is in its lowest possible energy would tend to, and eventually have no choice but, to be in equilibrium. For such a state to be dynamic it would need an influx of energy. For such a state to be unstable it would not be in its lowest possible energy.

I didn't think I had to ... Really ? Is that the lowest energy state ? Or is this ??? Not if we both learn something 🙂 .

Thanks Swansont. Was just about to reply that the energy states @studiot talks about are already occupied, and in equilibrium with gravity ( a conservative force ). To access any other independent states, or degrees of freedom, you would need to add useable energy. The same can be said for @sethoflagos planet and atmosphere example. They are in equilibrium with gravity; where are the other independent states, or degrees of freedom, that are available ?

If the energy of the system has a path to another state ( an independent degree of freedom ) then that 'dilutes' the energy available, and entropy increases. If there is no path to another state, then the system is in equilibrium at maximum entropy. The example I previously used was proton decay, as we are not sure it can happen. If it does decay ( no sooner than 1034 years ), then it provides a path to another state, and proton decay may well provide the 'last' useable energy of the universe, before 'heat death'.

The only solution seems to be a mix of Capitalism ( for a viable economy ) and Socialism ( for protection of the vulnerable and 'structure' for society ). The US used to have a pretty good mix until the 70s-80s. It has gone downhill since, and fallen off the cliff last january. Canada seems to have a decent mix ( why I live here ), but there are grumblings that some want to change the current Capitalism/Socialism mix. I guess every country has people that want a 'change of mix', and some ( Russia, China, Iran, NKorea, the US and others ) have very valid reasons.

Could be; he doesn't seem human.

You may see entropy from a Chemistry viewpoint @sethoflagos , I see it from a Physics viewpoint ( subtle difference ). Entropy is a measure of the number of ways, or degrees of freedom, that energy/particles can be arranged in. Maximal entropy is when all possible states are occupied and there are no further paths to other independent states. I don't see the relevance of 'structures'. I believe the Equipartition Theorem is a valid example

Machines could conceivably travel among stars at light-speed. Here's the scenario ... A machine intelligence transmits plans for a sufficiently advanced civilization to build a copy of itself on another system. It then transmits its 'software' to the copy machine at the speed of light. It then 'looks around', and when satisfied, beams its consciousness/software back to its origin. The plans to build the copy could be hidden or in plain sight, depending on whether its purpose was nefarious, or not. Maybe the Government already got those messages, and is busy building AI Data Centers which in, a few decades, will contain the 'consciousness' of alien invaders ....

Kind of shocking that in some ways ( wealth distribution ) things were better for black people in the 60s. It would be even more enlightening if an inflation graph was superimposed on those charts. I would be willing to bet that they have also fallen behind in 'purchasing power' even more than other groups. And that would affect whether they can afford food to stay healthy, purchase housing, or retirement savings.

As i see it, even if we moved away from a Capitalist system, to a fully Socialist, or even Communist system, but kept the practice of wealthy individuals/companies being able to lobby, or otherwise influence Government, we would be in exactly the same situation. The wealth discrepancies are no less pronounced in states that rebelled and tried the Marx experiment. V Putin is kept in power by Russian oligarchs, and whenever one of them gets 'out of line' it necessitates a push out of the nearest window. Money always talks louder than reason; as Swansont says "Its human nature".

Idolize is too strong a word, but I do admire R Oppenheimer, E Fermi, L Szilard, H Bethe, R Feynman, E Teller, E Lawrence, J Chadwick, G Seaborg, and others who took part in the development of the American atomic bombs that killed over 200000 people on two separate days in 1945. A number of deaths that is 1000 times larger than the Sand Creek Massacre. Can you see my point now, or do I need to elaborate ? I don't think that particular system is the main fault. The bigger problem is that our elected representatives are bought by wealthy individuals and corporations ( who are now 'individuals' in the eyes of the Supreme Court. These permissive laws put another tool in the hand of the corporations who add to the toolbox that enables them to generate massive profits. Neither the politicians or the wealthy ( corporations/individuals ) have any incentive to change the situation, as they both profit at taxpayer/workers expense. My apologies if I say 'our', as I'm not American, but until Jan 2025 when you guys lost your way, I considered myself almost American. Unfortunately Canada is only slightly better, but we are still vulnerable to American economic pressure. I guess we'll just have to join the EU.

Great; Just what we needed. A schizophrenic AI.

Yeah, I guess Phi and I had been agreeing too much lately; that's gotta stop. ( and this is meandering a bit off track ) Nobody is 100% good or 100% bad. We admire people for certain things they do, because those things are important to us at certain periods in time, and we ignore unsavory actions they may take, because they are not important to us ... at that point in time. As our sensibilities evolve and change over time so do our priorities, and things we may have ignored hundreds of years ago have now become despicable acts. I don't judge the past with today's viewpoint and sensibilities. And the acts for which they were admired, still deserve admiration. I don't want to get religious, but someone once said "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." It's highly unlikely, but, who knows, maybe someday even D Trump will be remembered for one good thing he did. ( although I can't think of anything )

Yeah. The Injustice Department released a batch of files also, and they contained references to multiple UCP. ( Unidentified Criminal Perpetrators ) And some of these UCPs may be DJTs. Is there no end to the lengths he'll go to in order to distract from his criminal activities ?

Sure, but the time span I mentioned is 1040 years. How much Rubidium 87 will be left after Ten Thousand Billion Billion Billion Billion years ?

not sure what advantage us gained by increasing the density of the water to a slurry. Sure, you can use a lower height for storage, but the pumping load increases proportionately with the increase in density. I haven't done, or seen, calculations so I'm not sure of any benefits other than convenience of using existing geological formations.

Photons of the CMB have red-shifted from 3500o to 2.7o in 1.4x1010 years. Once all the stars burn out ( say 1020 years ), how long do you think it will take for any of their emitted photons to red-shift to an energy where they can no longer excite fundamental particles? Another 1010 years ? What will they be then ? At that time, the only source of useable energy might come from proton decay ( assuming it actually happens ).