Tag Archives: galaxy

April 19, 2024

Friday Notes (Apr 19, 2024)

Often, the hardest part of Friday Notes (and, in fact, most) posts is writing the lede. Very soon after I began back in 2011, I settled on a three-part opening structure consisting of (as my template puts it): Intro… More… Punchline… followed by the page break that divides the lede from the body of the post.

That page break comes into play when WordPress lists a bunch of posts as well as in the notification emails (except in the double-damned WordPress Reader, which corrupts everything in the name of sameness). And while I’m on the topic of WordPress, I’m getting really fed up with it.

But that’s a post for another day. For now, I’ve got Notes…

16 Comments | tags: Bentley, food, galaxy, Invincible, Spider Robinson, stupid people, stupidity | posted in Friday Notes

June 9, 2020

Entropy and Cosmology

By Wyrd Smythe

Last time I started talking about entropy and a puzzle it presents in cosmology. To understand the puzzle we have to understand entropy, which is a crucial part of our view of physics. In fact, we consider entropy to be a (statistical) law about the behavior of reality. That law says: Entropy always increases.

There are some nuances to this, though. For example we can decrease entropy in a system by expending energy. But expending that energy increases the entropy in some other system. Overall, entropy does always increase.

This time we’ll see how Roger Penrose, in his 2010 book Cycles of Time, addresses the puzzle entropy creates in cosmology.

26 Comments | tags: black hole, cosmology, entropy, galaxy, Immanuel Kant, laws of thermodynamics, Roger Penrose, thermodynamics, universe | posted in Physics

March 22, 2015

How Big is God?

By Wyrd Smythe

“Space is big. Really big.”

When I started blogging here, one of the first bloggers I followed was Robin, of Witless Dating After Fifty. Over the years, she’s several times mentioned a great question her dad often posed when discussing religion with someone: “How big is your god?”

Last week my buddy and I were having our weekly beer- and gab-fest and our (typically very meandering) conversation came to touch on the problems with young Earth creationism — the Christian fundamentalist idea that the universe is only thousands of years old.

In fact, there’s a pair of real whopper problems involved!

46 Comments | tags: atheism, creationism, deism, galaxy, God, science and spirituality, solar system, spirituality, stars, Sun, theism, universe, young Earth creationism | posted in Religion, Sunday Sermons

September 14, 2012

BB #12: Bring the Bubbly

By Wyrd Smythe

It’s party time! Friday night, and everything’s right.

For your consideration, there’s celebration in the air (that’s no exaggeration). We’re talking ’bout elation; lookin’ for participation. Ya gotta feel the situation. Join with the recreation; enjoy the circulation (and the conversation).

Listen to that good vibration, trackin’ jubilation destination. Forget your reputation; forget your moderation; ain’t no humiliation (that’s a stipulation). There’s no registration, no identification authentication.

I’m sure it’s no revelation; fermentation fascination will bring inebriation (and hallucination). Hesitation just won’t do; you have an invitation! There is no limitation at this here presentation.

That was my narration; how ’bout a small ovation?

26 Comments | tags: beer, celebrate, Champagne, galaxy, Kessel Run, light year, Milky Way, parsec, Pluto, Sol, solar system, sun sign | posted in Brain Bubble, Life