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The clock runs down. I lift the weight by exerting the proper amount of energy, and in this action the law of conservation of energy is strictly obey… - William Crookes
" "The clock runs down. I lift the weight by exerting the proper amount of energy, and in this action the law of conservation of energy is strictly obeyed. But now I have the choice of either letting the weight fall free in a fraction of a second, or, constrained by the wheelwork, in twenty-four hours. I can do which I like, and whichever way I decide, no more energy is developed in the fall of the weight. I strike a match; I can use it to light a cigarette or to set fire to a house. I write a telegram; it may be simply to say I shall be late for dinner, or it may produce fluctuations on the stock exchange that will ruin thousands. In these cases the actual force required in striking the match or in writing the telegram is governed by the law or conservation of energy; but the vastly more momentous part, which determines the words I use or the material I ignite, is beyond such a law. It is probable that no expenditure of energy need be used in the determination of direction one way more than another. Intelligence and free will here come into play, and these mystic forces are outside the law of conservation of energy as understood by physicists.
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About William Crookes
Sir William Crookes (June 17, 1832 – April 4, 1919) was an English chemist and physicist who attended the Royal College of Chemistry, in London, and worked on spectroscopy. He was a pioneer in the development of vacuum tubes, inventing the Crookes tube, and was controversial in his advocacy of research into psychic abilities and other paranormal phenomena.
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Sir William Crookes
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Additional quotes by William Crookes
The production of motion, molar or molecular, is governed by physical laws, which it is the business of the philosopher to find out and correlate. The law of the conservation of energy overrides all laws, and it is a preeminent canon of scientific belief that for every act done a corresponding expenditure of energy must be transformed. No work can be effected without using up a corresponding value in energy of another kind. But to us the other side of the problem is even of more importance. Granted the existence of a certain kind of molecular motion, what is it that determines its direction along one path rather than another?
It can scarcely be denied that the fundamental phenomena which first led mankind into chemical inquiries are those of combustion. But, as we have just seen, minimized beings would be unable to produce fire at will, except by certain chemical reactions, and would have little opportunity of examining its nature. They might occasionally witness forest fires, volcanic eruptions, etc.; but such grand and catastrophic phenomena, though serving to reveal to our supposed Lilliputians the existence of combustion, would be ill suited for quiet investigation into its conditions and products. Moreover, considering the impossibility they would experience of pouring water from one test tube to another, the ordinary operations of analytical chemistry and of all manipulations depending on the use of the pneumatic trough would remain forever a sealed book.
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The human creature represents the most perfect thinking and acting machine yet evolved on this earth, developing through countless ages in strict harmony with the surrounding conditions of temperature, atmosphere, light, and gravitation. The profound modifications in the human frame, which any important alteration in either of these factors would occasion, are strangely unconsidered. It is true there have been questionings as to the effects that might be occasioned by changes in temperature and atmospheric composition, but possible variations in gravitation seem almost to have escaped notice. The human body, which long experience and habit have taught us to consider in its highest development as the perfection of beauty and grace — "formed in the image of God " — is entirely conditioned by the strength of gravitation on this globe. So far as has been possible to ascertain, the intensity of gravity has not varied appreciably within those geologic ages covering the existence of animated thinking beings.
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