Constraints: thinking out loud
My brother Bart and I used to imagine up various super powers and what one would do with them. Every once in awhile we would create someone who was pretty much omnipotent. Things got boring about then because how can you have a plot involving someone who can do anything? The imposition of constraints in that case made things fun. How much could you do with just the power to shoot sharp pencils out of your fingers?
Yesterday I had the neat juxtaposition of opportunities. In the morning I read Lehi. I was trying to apply his words to my role as a young men's advisor: And if ye say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished way.
Here we have Lehi explaining that law is central to God's creation. If you remove the law you lose the creation. I couldn't help but try and apply the scripture to my calling and to other endeavors. And if ye say there are no expectations, ye shall also say there is no breaching of those expectations. If ye shall say there is no breaching of those expectations, ye shall also say there is no success. And if there be no success there be no happiness. And if there be no success nor happiness there be no failure nor misery. And if these things are not there is no young men's advisor. And if there is no young men's advisor there is no young men's program, for nothing has been created; wherefore, the whole program may as well have vanished way.
Anyway, what I was thinking during the study is that when you are in charge of a social program you are asked to perform an act of creation. You are trying to create something that is more than a bunch of people gathering together to waste time. And what I was learning was that creating or maintaining a social program requires the defining and maintaining of a code or standard of conduct. If there is no code or standard there is no society.
Or perhaps it all applies better to a game. If you don't define the rules of the game, if you don't define the ways in which you win or lose the game, you have no game. And so you create a game by defining rules or constraints. And goals.
The second opportunity I had yesterday was to grade some biophysics homeworks. The assignment was mostly on entropy. So energy is constant in our universe as far as we can tell. But entropy is always increasing. You can decrease the entropy in a part of the universe so long as you have a larger increase in entropy in the universe as a whole. Entropy prevents you from using energy to do work. Imagine that you are given a fixed amount of usable energy in an isolated system. Usable energy is called free energy. As time goes by the entropy in your system increases and you begin to run out of free energy. After enough time has gone by the entropy in your system is maximized and you can do nothing more. Even though your total energy has remained constant, you have lost the order in your system that made it physically possible to access that energy. You have lost your free energy.
So what does this have to do with the rest of the discussion? Because the way that you increase the entropy of a system is by removing constraints on that system. If you remove the constraints quickly you forfeit your chance to do work with the free energy that used to be present. A certain amount of free energy is lost. Forever. To the whole universe. For example, if you have a box of air there is a pressure on each of the walls. You can use that pressure to push something. If instead you poke a hole in the wall of the box and let the gas escape you allow each particle to follow a less constrained trajectory. The particles will escape and you will lose your pressure having done no work. Your free energy is gone.
Yesterday I had the neat juxtaposition of opportunities. In the morning I read Lehi. I was trying to apply his words to my role as a young men's advisor: And if ye say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished way.
Here we have Lehi explaining that law is central to God's creation. If you remove the law you lose the creation. I couldn't help but try and apply the scripture to my calling and to other endeavors. And if ye say there are no expectations, ye shall also say there is no breaching of those expectations. If ye shall say there is no breaching of those expectations, ye shall also say there is no success. And if there be no success there be no happiness. And if there be no success nor happiness there be no failure nor misery. And if these things are not there is no young men's advisor. And if there is no young men's advisor there is no young men's program, for nothing has been created; wherefore, the whole program may as well have vanished way.
Anyway, what I was thinking during the study is that when you are in charge of a social program you are asked to perform an act of creation. You are trying to create something that is more than a bunch of people gathering together to waste time. And what I was learning was that creating or maintaining a social program requires the defining and maintaining of a code or standard of conduct. If there is no code or standard there is no society.
Or perhaps it all applies better to a game. If you don't define the rules of the game, if you don't define the ways in which you win or lose the game, you have no game. And so you create a game by defining rules or constraints. And goals.
The second opportunity I had yesterday was to grade some biophysics homeworks. The assignment was mostly on entropy. So energy is constant in our universe as far as we can tell. But entropy is always increasing. You can decrease the entropy in a part of the universe so long as you have a larger increase in entropy in the universe as a whole. Entropy prevents you from using energy to do work. Imagine that you are given a fixed amount of usable energy in an isolated system. Usable energy is called free energy. As time goes by the entropy in your system increases and you begin to run out of free energy. After enough time has gone by the entropy in your system is maximized and you can do nothing more. Even though your total energy has remained constant, you have lost the order in your system that made it physically possible to access that energy. You have lost your free energy.
So what does this have to do with the rest of the discussion? Because the way that you increase the entropy of a system is by removing constraints on that system. If you remove the constraints quickly you forfeit your chance to do work with the free energy that used to be present. A certain amount of free energy is lost. Forever. To the whole universe. For example, if you have a box of air there is a pressure on each of the walls. You can use that pressure to push something. If instead you poke a hole in the wall of the box and let the gas escape you allow each particle to follow a less constrained trajectory. The particles will escape and you will lose your pressure having done no work. Your free energy is gone.
posted by Douglas H. at 3:09 PM
2 Comments:
So I'm wondering what the code of conduct for the young men is, and who is deciding it?
I sat down to publish my current goals to my blog, and found your blog confirms that action while suggesting a further step. Without rules/guidelines, how would I ever achieve my goals? I wouldn't.
Also, I remember one night in particular, when I just wanted to make up a creature equal to your omnipotent mix. I called it a Bull, and said it could do anything. You expressed concern that it wasn't as fun if it was omnipotent, and for the life of me I couldn't understand why. What could be more awesome than a creature that could do anything?
I think I understand your concern better now. But I still would rather be omnipotent than just be able to shoot pencils out of my fingertips. :)
The most fascinating to me has always been controlling time: freezing it for everyone else but me while I drive around in someone's Ferrari, speeding my own time up just a tad to win a race, stepping back in time to see how I could change the future (how could that work, considering the future had already happened, so it can't be changed, unless there was an alternate reality?), etc.
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