Introduction
Due 9 Mar 2004, 8 AM
Welcome to the first preflight questions page. Please enter your
identification information, and then answer the questions. Your grade is only
based on participation; not getting the right answer.
Please input the following:
Based on your reading of the introduction, why are gravity and entropy
in conflict? (i.e. state clearly what each is and then explain how
they work against each other.)
This course will be dealing quite a bit with large numbers and exponential
notation. Sometimes it's hard to keep an intuitive grasp on the implications
of changes in the exponenant. For example, the Universe is about 14 billion
years old right now. That's about 1010 years, or a cosmological
decade of 10. The Degenerate Era is defined to begin at a cosmological decade
of 15. Roughly how many times over will the entire length of time from
the beginning of the Universe to now repeat itself from now until the
Degenerate Era begins? (Please answer in words, not numbers, for this one.)
Imagine you had an atomic nucleus, like, say, an atom of iron, inside a special
box. This box has the amazing property that when you flip the switch
on its lid, the force of gravity inside the box vanishes completely.
What would happen to the iron nucleus if you were to flip the switch?
It would diffuse out into a wispy gas
It would implode into a tiny black hole
It would explode and release a lot of energy
Nothing noticable
(Optional) What puzzled you about the reading? What would you like to have
explained in more depth? What questions would you ask to see if the
reader had grasped the most important concepts in the chapter?
When you are satisfied with your entries, you may
Or, you can
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