Life without the second law of thermodynamics essay

Life Without the Second Law of Thermodynamics            Thermodynamics is the branch of Science which investigates heat power and exchange of energy transfer (Taylor, 1999). Under this scientific domain, four laws were developed and justified by early scientists to explain the underlying concepts of the aforementioned subject of Physical Sciences.

These are the Zeroth law, the first law, second law, and the third law of thermodynamics (McCarthy, 2005). Understanding these laws are essential to mankind’s operations of machinery, automobile, and any other related equipment that can help us improve our life here on Earth. However, emphasis on this paper will only be given to the Second Law of Thermodynamics and the kind of life that I, the author, will have if the this law does not naturally exist in nature.            The second law of thermodynamics was actually the first of the four postulates to be introduced in the nineteenth century. In a nut shell, the second law explains that the spontaneous direction of energy flow tends to occur from an area of concentration to becoming diffused or dispersed and eventually spread out to an area of less concentration (Lambert, 2010).

Practically speaking, the second law of thermodynamics is best illustrated as the flow of heat from hot source to cold environment. But in a more general picture, this law condenses the idea that energy cannot be concentrated or be localized in only one area and, if no hindrance obscures their way, will flow and disperse itself (Lambert, 2010). But what really happen if the second law of thermodynamics does not naturally occur in nature or is absolutely absent  in this world? Below is my would-be world if the previously mentioned event will happen.            My alarm clock rang at six in the morning. I woke up and went into the kitchen to prepare breakfast for myself and my sister. I looked for the frying pan, cooking oil, bacon and ham to be cooked, and the plate where I will place our viand that morning. I lighted the stove and placed the frying pan with cooking oil on top of it. Ten minutes have passed, the pan and the oil are still cold without even a touch of heat on the surface.

I waited again for the next twenty minutes or more but nothing happened. Finally, out of frustration and immense hunger, I decided to place the setting of the stove at maximum, turned off our air conditioning unit which I predict was affecting the heat process, and prayed with all my heart and soul that the pan will be hot soon. Luckily, after about two hours of waiting, the cooking oil on the frying pan were hot enough to cook our frozen ham and bacon. But just when I thought the worst is over, it took another hour before our food was cooked! Preparing breakfast has never been this hard. When the table was set, I called my sister, we ate our breakfast, and proceeded to clean the kitchen.

Again, I noticed the frying pan that is resting on top of the stove, it is still hot. I run water on it but it remained to be hot. I can’t believe it, does this imply that the time I will need to wait for this pan to cool down is twice the time I waited before I was able to cook our food? It was really a frustrating experience. It took an hour for that pan to cool down which means that half of my day was already consumed just because of my cooking problems.            That afternoon, I was sitting in front of the television watching global news. A reporter, whose background is a huge steel milling facility in Chicago, said that the steel milling company will no longer be able to produce steel because such production require impossible amount of energy. The spoke person of the company said that steel production is no longer economically feasible and is actually impossible because the energy needed to convert the raw materials is beyond the capacity of their machineries. This person said that the purification process of the materials is already a hard task since it now requires tremendous amount of energy.

He said that without the appropriate amount of energy, the steel industry will soon face its end. After watching the news, the images of building, bridges, and ships with no steel flashed in my mind. What will happen to this modern civilization without steel and other types of metal to help us build infrastructure? Where did that energy go? Before I was able to finish my thoughts, odd sounds filled the room and caught my attention.

At first, I thought that these sounds were coming from one of my family’s appliances so I searched each and everyone of them but none emitted the crumbling sounds that were bothering me. To my surprise, the sounds were coming from me! It was my stomach that was releasing the annoying noise. Soon after, I realized that I am hungry again when the truth is I have just finished eating a big slice of cake ten minutes ago.

What’s happening to me? What’s the problem with my metabolism? Is there no food digestion happening in my digestive system that makes me hungry all the time? My sister said that she was feeling the same thing and that she could not accomplish her assignment because of the pain she felt on her abdomen. It seems that our digestive system or our physiological system in general has failed to digest the food we ate, extract the nutrients from them, and provide our bodies with the needed energy to perform our daily activities. I just can’t help it. It seems that everything is going wrong.

My sister and I went outside of the house. We were not aware that the thing we will witness outside are far more puzzling than the things we have experienced inside our house. Broken glass windows were reassembling themselves. Coins thrown in the wishing well years ago were being lifted out of the well without any human or animal aid. Water from a broken tank were seeping back into the tank spontaneously. I can name a hundred more events similar to what I have already mentioned.

We felt like we were watching a movie that is being played backwards only that this time, the actual world is the one playing forward on a backward manner! What happened to the arrow of time (Berger, 2001)? I was suddenly slapped of my sister. She said I was screaming while I was sleeping. I wondered in disbelief. I am really thankful that that was just a dream.

I never knew that would be the effect of the loss of the second law of thermodynamics in our daily life. ReferenceBerger, D. J. (2001). The second law of thermodynamic.                            Thermodynamics: Physics/Earth/Space. Retrieved 06 August 2010, from             http://www.

bluffton. edu/~bergerd/NSC_111/thermo6. htmlLambert, F. L.

(2010). The second law of thermodynamics. Retrieved 06 August 2010, from      http://secondlaw. oxy. edu/index. htmlMcCarthy, R. (2005).

The Laws of Thermodynamics: Understanding Heat and Energy               Transfers. NY, USA: The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. Taylor, P. S.

(1999). Second law of thermodynamics- does this basic law of nature prevent         evolution. Eden Communications. Retrieved 06 August 2010, from    http://www. christiananswers. net/q-eden/edn-thermodynamics. html