From: ram@zedat.fu-berlin.de   
      
   Mikko  wrote or quoted:   
   >On 2024-06-18 18:25:10 +0000, Stefan Ram said:   
   >>. Here's a quotation from "Quora":   
   . . .   
   >>|It turns out that it is a general law of nature that physical   
   >>|systems always "want" to be in the state of lowest possible   
   >>|energy.   
   . . .   
   >Not exactly. The law is that entropy always increases, which means   
   >that energy becomes more evenly distributed.   
      
     The heat death (the conversion of all forms of energy into   
     heat energy) is rather something long-term, but one can also   
     be interested in the dynamics within shorter periods of time.   
      
     At the system boundaries, the flow of extensive quantities   
     is determined by the difference of the intensive quantities   
     (potentials).   
      
     Thus, (positive) electric charge (extensive quantity)   
     flows, for example, from the system with the higher   
     electric potential (intensive quantity) to the system   
     with the smaller electric potential.   
      
     Yes, and in doing so, the total energy in the two systems would   
     become smaller. But since energy must not be destroyed, it must   
     be converted into another form. If the systems cannot exchange any   
     other forms of energy, then only the generation of entropy remains.   
     And it then flows rather to the colder of the two systems.   
      
     So you were right insofar as one must take entropy into account.   
      
     Here is the formulation with potential differences, once without   
     and once with "want":   
      
     Without "want": When two systems come into contact, an extensive   
     quantity flows to the system with the smaller associated potential.   
      
     With "want": Every system wants to give off its extensive   
     quantities (which reduces its energy), but this is only   
     possible if the system finds another system in which the   
     potential associated with the extensive quantity is smaller.   
      
     If we regard a system with a small potential as "weak"   
     and a system with a large potential as "strong", we can say   
     that every system wants to impose its energy in the form of   
     extensive quantities on other systems, but it only succeeds   
     in doing so if it finds a weaker system.   
      
     The concept of the thermodynamic potential, which determines   
     the direction of the flow of extensive quantities, was still   
     missing from your explanations.   
      
     (I'm not particularly interested in the Higgs field itself, as   
     I wrote, but if I imagine the Higgs field and another field, and   
     each wants to give away its energy, then I can't find suitable   
     forms of energy with their associated extensive and intensive   
     quantities that would help me predict the temporal evolution.)   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)