The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid-term. Hat top to Annabelle Mark who is a constant source of this type of material
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?
The answer by one student was so 'profound' that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant. One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today.
Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.
This gives two possibilities:
- If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
- If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.
So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, 'It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,' and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct......leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting 'Oh my God.'
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+
Comments (11)
This is one hell of an answer for this lapsed Catholic! Bravo!
Posted by Maureen Thomosn | January 14, 2009 4:38 PM
Posted on January 14, 2009 16:38
brilliant! what a great story.
Posted by willem brethouwer | January 14, 2009 8:26 PM
Posted on January 14, 2009 20:26
I think you get an A+ for this gem Dave too
Posted by Robert Paterson | January 15, 2009 1:42 AM
Posted on January 15, 2009 01:42
this is real cool!
Posted by amit | January 15, 2009 3:30 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 15:30
Dave
There is another proof using biblical references to show that Heaven is Hotter than hell (and a refutation of the same in the best scientific basis)
http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/hell.htm
Dermot
Posted by Dermot | January 15, 2009 4:04 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 16:04
This has been around for a while - there's a nice history of it on Snopes:
http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/hell.asp
Posted by Richard Hare | January 15, 2009 5:34 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 17:34
Brilliant story, such fun! Thanks. Dermit: the version of the story you have linked to above omits the hilarious concluding argument starring Teresa. Wonder why. :)
Posted by Mireille Jansma | January 15, 2009 7:09 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 19:09
I allways considered this one an urban myth
Posted by Harold | January 15, 2009 8:20 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 20:20
I guess one question which arises from this, is who actually believed the opening sentence of Dave's post? And this raises the question of authenticity of 'stories' and narrative in general. Does it matter? Not in this case, because it is just a bit of clever humour/fun. Does it matter in other situations. Well......of course, it depends......context is all. I have often wondered about this aspect of Cynefin approaches.
PS Dave.....back to our previous discourse. I have discovered that in IBM there are several thousand Apple users. A senior manager was proudly presenting with his Apple last week and said you could use whatever machine you wanted.....there were guffaws all round though when he couldn't get his presentation to work properly.(Looked a nicely designed piece of metal though). :-)
PPS I really wish you had a forum for more in depth discussions and proper threads!
Posted by David Cronshaw | January 15, 2009 11:34 PM
Posted on January 15, 2009 23:34
Kia ora Dave
Just as Rowan Atkinson said, when he played the devil welcoming newcomers, many years ago before hell froze over, "Atheists? Yes, you must be feeling a right bunch of charlies right now."
Catchya later
from Middle-earth
Posted by Ken Allan | January 16, 2009 11:37 AM
Posted on January 16, 2009 11:37
my teacher showed this to my class and i thought it was a great responce to the question, very creative.
Posted by moemoe | November 13, 2009 3:33 AM
Posted on November 13, 2009 03:33