Why Over-Unity is Possible

[pauldude000]

That is exactly what Maxwell predicted, even long before we created a superconductor
Resistance is a function of heat.
With no heat, there is no resistance.

That is true, but you are not taking the concept far enough. There are also no I squared R losses in a system that can indeed do work as it does creates a perfectly efficient magnetic field. That electric current in a superconductive coil can theoretically flow in a circle forever if their is no interaction with the field it generates. If an armature is turned in that field, also made of superconductive material, the generation of electricity will be at perfect unity and the work performed will be at COP = 1.


Notice that last statement. No electrical non-superconductive system we have can achieve unity. Ask yourself how unity is measured; what system is used? Subjects can become interesting when examining base concepts.

[pauldude000]

With very weak magnets, you can prove that they do work against gravity over time.


Take a magnet that can barely hold itself up on a steel ceiling
And watch it.
Over some time, gravitational acceleration wins and the magnet falls.

I agree with you, but the problem stems with a short-sighted and quite stupid scientific definition for work. Too many physicists are still basing their logic on what they can perceive with their eyes. They cannot wrap their heads around the concept that a mass can undergo a positive acceleration yet remain motionless to their frame of reference and still accomplish work. They hold the god's eye view every time they perform an experiment and most cannot understand even that basic concept.


Overcoming negative acceleration to achieve equilibrium is equivalent in comparison to the same mass accelerated to achieve an equal positive acceleration.  Both are moving, just one SEEMS to be stationary.


Why this is so hard to accept is philosophy. You see, that magnet experiment is just a simple example of common everyday perpetual motion; one example among many. Perpetual motion is commonplace and many physicists do NOT want to accept even the concept of perpetual motion let alone the fact that so many common physical systems are examples by very definition, both on the micro and macro scales of perception. Illogical personal bias, pure and simple. Who cares what anyone does or does not want to accept -- personal opinions and personal desires do not change reality.


If gravity were not doing constant work, expending energy on a microsecond by microsecond basis, every planet and star in the known universe would literally explode radially outward into some really interesting gaseous and particulate forms from centrifugal force.


The expenditure and/or conversion of energy over time actually defines work in this fine universe, not the simplistic third-grade, tinker-toy, mechanistic notion of force X distance which is just one basic type of an example of energy expenditure over time.

[forest]

There is more to that. A piece of wood lying on tabletop is working against gravity but it's not recognized as work done.

[sm0ky2]

There is more to that. A piece of wood lying on tabletop is working against gravity but it's not recognized as work done.

Yes, if we follow that logic, the table rests on the earth which is the gravitational source.
So the piece of wood is not "accelerating".


a magnet repelled in the air is resting on the magnetic field, which sits on the magnet,
which rests on the table on the earth.


the thing about relativity is it requires two perspectives.
and it doesn't matter which we choose, but both must be present.
an object in motion has no energy.
But relative to another object, it does.
(or the other object does, or we can divide it among them)


The point is, our definition of work is relativistic, not an absolute energy value.


If two objects are moving at the same velocity and vector
they are relatively stationary to each other, and there can be no work done
between them.
However, relative to another object, now work can be done.


The wood on the table does no "work" against the earth
But the table has the same velocity as the earth.
As does the wood.


So when the earth is moving towards a relatively stationary object
the wood can perform work when it hits that object.


how much "kinetic energy" the wood actually has is irrelevant to our
energy analysis, because the work done is relativistic, only to the object
being hit by the wood.


If the wood hits an object that is moving in the same direction as the earth
but as a lower velocity, less work will be done than when it hit the stationary
object.


But the wood still has the same absolute value of kinetic energy
(we just have no way of knowing what that value is)


The velocity of the earth cannot be determined, except in relativistic terms.


energy, as it applies to work is not an absolute value, or even a deterministic
quantity.
But a relative one.

[pauldude000]

There is more to that. A piece of wood lying on tabletop is working against gravity but it's not recognized as work done.

That is absolutely true Forest. However, in no sense of the word is that piece of wood acting under any acceleration other than that of gravity. Gravity is doing work in the wood scenario, otherwise the wood would fly off into space, along with the table it is lying on. It is not resisting gravity at all. Gravity is resisting radial forces applied by centrifugal force caused by the rotating mass of the earth on which both the table and wood are loosely sitting upon its surface. Two forces are acting upon the wood. They are both doing work. The wood is not applying either force upon its environment so is doing no work at all.


The work issue is based upon far too shallow of thought, ignoring common forces. A lot could be excused from science at the time periods many of these things were first pondered, since they had far less information to work with than we do now. It is past time for an overhaul, at least of the base definitions, to bring us out of the 1600's.


So many things break down into circular logic, circular cause and consequence, fallacy of composition and fallacy of division it is not funny, and inherent basal relationships are still treated as if they were somehow mysterious magik.