Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site umcp-cs.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!umcp-cs!mangoe From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Re: Asimov and scientific revenge Message-ID: <1318@umcp-cs.UUCP> Date: Wed, 21-Aug-85 17:36:40 EDT Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.1318 Posted: Wed Aug 21 17:36:40 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 24-Aug-85 18:51:41 EDT References: <149@rtp47.UUCP> Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD Lines: 41 In article <149@rtp47.UUCP> throopw@rtp47.UUCP (Wayne Throop) writes: >The story was told from the viewpoint of a third fellow, who observed >the incident and smelled a rat. The reason the pool ball took off like >a bullet was that it was made *massless* by the gravity-nullifying >device. Massless particles *must* travel at the speed of light, hence >the ball takes off at lightspeed. Upon leaving the gravity-free zone, >the transition back to massy-ness, and back to sane velocity (for massy >particles) is incomplete, and the ball still has near-light speed. In >the story, there is foreshadowing of this, and after the fact this >effect is used to manfacture energy (by blowing small particles into the >field and capturing the radiation that results yeilding heat, driving >turbines, etc, etc). >Now then, in the story, the slow fellow had figgured out what was going >on before making his shot. He realized that a particle going into the >field "ought to" leave the field along the same line, but accelerated to >near-lightspeed. The third party suspected him of this, but the slow >guy covered his tracks well, by promoting the theory that the exit path >was random. The third party was the only one who noticed that the ball >went *into* the field aimed directly at the quick fellow's heart, and he >couldn't get anybody else to believe him. >Sadly, it seems to me that there is a problem with Asimov's reasoning. >Such a field "should" act on the elementary particles that *make up* the >pool ball, not on the pool ball as a whole. Thus, since the particles >that make it up are vibrating every-which-way (in thermal motion), the >ball should have *exploded*, leaving a sizeable crater, rather than >turning into a pool-ball-diameter beam of hard radiation. Ah well, a >fairly nice short story with a twist ending, even so. A more serious problem is that this violates mass-energy conservation rather severely. Unless you're pumping enough energy into the thing, when the thing comes back out, either the velocity must go away or you've got to lose a lot of mass. (you also need it to get rid of momentum.) An object that can accelerate a cue ball to near lightspeed is sopping up a LOT of energy. It's also hard to imagine what happens to a bunch of massless particles having both color and charge. Charley Wingate