quote:

---

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

Also, it might be a pain putting this kind of heat engine into a vehicle, because it has to be pretty darn massive. You might use it to generate the power needed to produce antimatter, then run your starships on matter-antimatter batteries.

---

quote:

---

Now I'm really wondering whether anyone has published a paper on the engineering issues in making and operating a Hawking furnace. I believe I just invented that name for this device, but it's an obvious enough concept that I'd be surprised if no-one had written it up.

---

quote:

---

What is the difference between the event horizon and the gravity well? What does "gravity well" mean?

---

quote:

---

A black hole behaves as a black body because not even light can escape it, despite its absolute speed.

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Bad-Ass Mother Custer:

Here is the scoop on power that seems too good to be true: it is. While it would certainly be spectacular (if more or less pointless) to create a black hole artificially, there would be no way to exploit it to create more power than had been invested into the black hole itself.

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

One really good thing to shovel into it would be a high net electric charge, so that you could manipulate the thing with electromagnetic fields. Hold it from falling through the floor with a nice E-field, though, and you could sit back and toast your tootsies.

---

quote:

---

Well, kind of. The temperature of a Hawking radiator is inversely proportional to its Schwarzchild radius, so a tiny black hole would be really hot. Depending on how tiny you made it, you might be dealing with gamma rays here too, in which case you might want to keep your shoes on.

---

quote:

---

If you would reduce all mass of the earth to a black hole, it would absorb all matter within a range of a few millimeters. Thus, the microscopic black hole wouldn't be very dangerous, but surely hard, if not impossible, to control.

---

quote:

---

I'll leave the first point aside. I think it's more or less irrelevant. For example, it would be hopeless attempting to prove that every prayer has the same value. :P

---

quote:

---

You make a good point about information. My definiton was obviously incomplete. But ultimately, it's still just about labels, and I think you know what I meant. (and no, I'm not a pantheist by any stretch :P )

---

quote:

---

Eh?

---

quote:

---

And what's pantheism again?

---

quote:

---

I define 'supernatural' as being outside the physical world. But as I said, it's just a case of labels. If you have a different word to mean that, use it.

---

quote:

---

Semantics. If it's not 'supernatural' by your definition, so be it. Instead of calling it a supernatural event, say God did it, and God is not exactly 'supernatural', or whatever you wish.

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Ash Lael:

Thuryl - Care to elaborate?

---

quote:

---

Actually, I don't agree. If you pray for a miracle, and believe God will do it, and he does, you've just predicted a miracle.

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Ash Lael:

If a guy did definitely come back from the dead and was now in perfect health, I'm not sure what you'd study, though. But your point is taken.

EDIT: Regarding mechanics, the actual theory behind miracles is really pretty simple. God exists, God is all-powerful, God occasionally performs miracles. It's testing it that's the trouble - a.l.a. your ball lightning example.

So suppose I rephrase my question. For you, what's the difference between the possibility of miracles and the possibility of ball lightning? Keep in mind here that I don't actually know anything about the latter. :P

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Ash Lael:

Plenty of alternative explanations. And any one of them is more likely than a miracle, because miracles don't happen. We know they don't happen, because they can't be proved. They can't be proved, because the evidence can always be explained another way. The evidence can always be explained away, because we know that any possible explanation beats miracles, because miracles don't happen. Therefore, miracles don't happen.

---

quote:

---

Originally written by 1001011001000:

over 200 genuses (that's probably not the correct plural :/)

---

quote:

---

Originally written by Ash Lael:

So your definition of humanly alive and actually alive would be a bit different to each other, right? So, you wouldn't consider a person alive when their brain stopped, even if their blood kept pumping, I assume. Or, if you would, if their heart stopped as well and a machine did the blood pumping and breathing and suchlike for them. Even though that person would be technically alive, he wouldn't be humanly alive, right?

---

quote:

---

say, if i wanted to make an anti-matter engine, capable of producing massive amounts of energy, how should i proceed?

---