Edge of Inanity Potential energy
M
By Al Carmichael
r. Joule was never late. One cold Buffalo morning, I sat with about 25 other teenagers in Herbert Hoover Junior High School, squirming and anxious, wondering why our physics teacher, Mr. Joule, wasn't there. We had been learning about energy, laws of thermodynamics and potential versus kinetic energy. The first Law of Thermodynamics states: “Energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed. The total amount of energy and matter in the Universe remains constant, merely changing from one form to another.” Potential Energy exists in objects because of their positions relative to other objects, or because of the earth’s gravitational field. Think of an apple in a tree, late in the fall, full of potential energy. As the apple falls, potential energy is turned into kinetic energy, finally spent on the ground, its potential energy all used up. From the moment I learned these laws of physics, I saw the world differently, my eyes opened to the hidden energies that surrounded me. Everything became exciting with a certain level of anticipation. Go on a roller coaster—click, click, click—potential energy building as you climb higher and higher. You can feel the energy bursting in your heart as you reach the top before the fall. I look at the pile of firewood in back of the house, in which the trees grew, died, and were cut by my friend and I with our powerful chainsaws, waiting with potential energy to heat my house for the winter. Energy exchanged for energy, exchanged again for energy. And ultimately, the energy of the sun, evaporating the water of the oceans, lifting into the sky, full of potential energy, falling on the earth in the form of rain or snow, rolling and crashing down rivers, finally coming to rest again in the ocean, energy spent until the cycle begins again. I think about all of this when my own potential energy is low, to lift me up with the wonder of it all. The school principal finally came in with a young man, unknown to us, and waited as the morning announcement commenced from the brown box, attached to the wall above his head. “We are sad to announce the passing of Mr. Joule, our physics teacher, who died last night…” The announcement went on, but already our class was full of murmurs and my friend Carol sobbed quietly behind me. I was too shocked to be sad, and immediately realized who the stranger was. He was our new physics teacher. When I think about death from a distance, I can see the energy cycle in a human life, the energy of
conception, amazing amounts of consumption and growth, resulting in an astonishing human life, full of potential energy, both physical and metaphorical. Then finally, at the end of this extraordinary energy cycle, all the potential energy is spent and the energy cycle continues on in a different form. But when death is personal, or happens too soon, it isn’t as easy to understand. The tragedy of the death of a grandparent, a parent, a child, or a friend, also is a tragedy of exponential potential energy lost. Anyone who has lost someone too soon, understands this. Everyone’s life has suddenly taken an altered path. Solace for loss can be found through family, friends, and spiritual beliefs. In addition to these, I find my solace in the first law of thermodynamics…“Energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed. The total amount of energy and matter in the Universe remains constant, merely changing from one form to another.” I know the energy of my family and friends is not gone. It is in me, it is in the earth, the sky and the universe. It’s up to me to make their energy my own.
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Winter 2010-11
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