didymos
Posts: 1828
Joined: Mar. 2008
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[quote=Henry J,Oct. 17 2009,09:34] | Quote | didymos, posted 10/16/09 10:52 PM
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givemeabreak
10/16/2009
8:44 pm
re #74
Actually there are some very interesting exceptions to the second law:
it should be noted that, counter-intuitive to materialistic thought, a computer does not consume energy during computation and will only consume energy when information is erased from it. This counter-intuitive fact is formally known as Landauer?s Principle. |
Really? I would have guessed that a computer would use energy whenever a bit flips to whichever state (0 or 1) uses more energy than the other state. "Erasing" information is ambiguous - the bits in a section of memory can be zeroed, set to all one's, or replaced by some pattern, and the energy requirement of doing so depends on which option is used.
Henry |
Ignore the bafflegab batshit77/givemeabreak version. What it is is that, in principle, computational operations can be performed in such a way that total entropy doesn't increase. It doesn't decrease either, though, so no SLoT violation. Also, this doesn't apply to any actual device. They all generate waste heat. It's a purely theoretical notion. There's also a combination of this with Maxwell's Demon: if you were sorting the molecules by way of reversible computational operations and you had an infinite amount of storage space, then you might be able to violate SLoT. But here's the thing. Well, besides the diffiiculty in acquiring an infinitely large memory. Anyway: Landauer's Principle is derived from the 2nd Law. As olegt said, it's a consequence of it, so there's something pretty fishy about using LP to violate it. I mean, if LP+Demon is correct, then the 2nd Law is wrong...but then what's the basis for LP?
ETA:
Disclaimer: I am not a physicist, so, you know, potential wrongness and all that jazz.
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I wouldn't be bothered reading about the selfish gene because it has never been identified. -- Denyse O'Leary, professional moron
Again "how much". I don't think that's a good way to be quantitative.-- gpuccio
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