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Why does thermodynamics laws look like a tautology ? (lemmy.ca)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/nostupidquestions@lemmy.ca
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1^st^ law of thermodynamics :
There is something that will always be the same.
2^nd^ law of thermodynamics :
Everything else always changes and never will be what it was before.

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[โ€“] 11 points 2 years ago (2 children)

It sounds like you're confused on what a natural law is. They do not prescribe the behavior of a system, they describe it.

The first law is a law because our observations state that all systems obey it, not the other way around.

What you're saying is "If there was a system that behaves fundamentally differently than every system yet observed, then it would not follow the laws of thermodynamics." Which is kind of the point.

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  • [โ€“] [S] -1 points 2 years ago*

    On a side note :
    is there something in nature that prescribes the conservation of energy ?

    (please, if you answer this, do so under my other comment (big bang...) ...I don't want to lose track of the main topic).

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  • [โ€“] [S] -2 points 2 years ago* (2 children)

    I am trying to find a loophole for the origin of the big Bang or whatever created the universe.

    P.S. What I'm saying could be something like : "if a system is empty it doesn't contain the first law".

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  • [โ€“] 8 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    To put it another way: These "laws" describe what we think is going on based upon human observations and testing.

    The scientific method is our tool for figuring this stuff out, and "laws" are subject to change when we figure out or discover something we didn't know before.

    Just because something is a scientific law does not mean that it's 100% correct and immutable for all time: It's just our concept of what seems to be happening based on what we observe and what we think we know.

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  • [โ€“] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    We don't know that the universe was truly created. The concept of things being "created" is something us humans came up with (usually meaning existing atoms are shifted into place for us to then recognize them as a certain object).

    We have never observed anything in the universe just popping into existence from nothing, so the least speculative theories assume that the universe did not either pop into existence from nothing.

    We do have evidence for the Big Bang, but it's not the creation of the universe, it's rather just the expansion of space (and is still occurring today). Before the Big Bang, the universe must've taken place in a more contracted space, but we don't know what that means in effect.

    You could also apply our imprecise human definition of the universe being "created" to mean that everything existed beforehand and it just got shifted into the recognizable universe we know today. That is something the Big Bang did do. I'm really not a fan of that, though, since it obviously confuses people.

    Here's a video explaining the Big Bang in more detail: https://tilvids.com/w/9kRqDF9pXrDFprLiAG1hAr
    (Unfortunately, the guy does talk of the universe being 'created' at the beginning of the video. Near the end is a more precise definition.)

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  • [โ€“] [S] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    Thanks for your time and attention.

    We have never observed anything in the universe just popping into existence from nothing (...)

    if we did, that would be a major shift in physics. in this regards I heard of (or read of) two candidates :
    .1 if universe's expansion continues to accelerate, (it would mean) dark energy is increassing.
    .2 an excess of hydrogen (clouds) outside of galaxies was observed that is difficult to explain with current cosmology.

    I know these are not direct observation of something popping up, ...but still.

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  • [โ€“] 2 points 2 years ago

    Yeah, dark energy is an interesting theory. I certainly don't understand enough about it to really be able to judge it, but it kind of feels like we're following our human tendency again, to find someone/-thing to blame, without that really aiding the explanation...

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