Hell (& Heaven) – a different perspective!

I received this thing on the e-mail and thought it deserved some space on my blog as it offers an interesting and different perspective on Heaven and Hell than my own article; http://stensbys.blogspot.com/2007/05/heaven-and-hell.html!

The following is “supposedly” an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid-term. 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.

Bonus Question:

Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

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:

1. 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.

2. 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 2 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."

I have only one objection to this… or two:

1. Being a Norwegian I already know where Hell is. It is in Norway (of course), just north of Trondheim – just look it up on the map!! Hell is generally a cold place and freezes over for about 6 months of the year. I don’t think this is due to a seasonal drop in souls entering… which brings me to my second objection.

2. Hell is a small place. If you take into account all history since beginning of time and the constant exponential flow of souls, you would expect Hell to be a much bigger place. It does not seem to grow much either… it’s becoming one of those ghost towns, LOL! According to Boyles theories this would mean a build up of pressure and a high temperature… We could make use of a hell of a lot more souls to heat things up - up there in Hell!!

I don’t think Boyle's theories apply in Hell!!