B Ideas regarding gravity and entropy

AI Thread Summary
The discussion explores the relationship between gravity and entropy, positing that gravity creates gradients for mechanical work while entropy works to dissolve these gradients. It questions whether gravitational wells can be considered localized areas of low entropy and discusses the statistical likelihood of air molecules being distributed unevenly in a gravitational field. Participants clarify that variations in pressure can occur without gravity, emphasizing that entropy generation relates to the smoothing of gradients in various physical properties. The conversation highlights the complexity of understanding these concepts, especially for those without a physics background. Overall, the interplay between gravity and entropy remains a nuanced topic in physics.
Jstoff
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TL;DR Summary
Ideas regarding gravity and entropy
I've never had any physics class before so please bare with me on my lack of understanding.

I've been thinking about gravity and its relation to entropy lately and was wondering if my thinking is correct.

Entropy seems to be an opposing force to gravity. where gravity is creating gradients that can be exploited for mechanical work, entropy seems to try to dissolve them. Are gravitation wells not "localized" spots of low entropy? I hear entropy explained with examples like " You wouldn't expect all of the air in room to be on one side of it, because that's statistically unlikely" which at a glance makes sense but even in an "0 g" environment are the air molecules not "statistically weighted" towards the side of the room with the strongest gravitational pull? Seeing that gravity has unlimited range this means there would always be some type of gradient of pressure no matter how small.

Every example of low entropy systems i can think of are a result of a gravitational pull. Is this correct or am i misunderstanding things?
 
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Jstoff said:
TL;DR Summary: Ideas regarding gravity and entropy

I've never had any physics class before so please bare with me ...
"Bear with me" is the expression you are looking for. "Bare with me" is a suggestion that we all take off our clothes together.
 
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Jstoff said:
TL;DR Summary: Ideas regarding gravity and entropy

I've never had any physics class before so please bare with me on my lack of understanding.

I've been thinking about gravity and its relation to entropy lately and was wondering if my thinking is correct.

Entropy seems to be an opposing force to gravity. where gravity is creating gradients that can be exploited for mechanical work, entropy seems to try to dissolve them. Are gravitation wells not "localized" spots of low entropy? I hear entropy explained with examples like " You wouldn't expect all of the air in room to be on one side of it, because that's statistically unlikely" which at a glance makes sense but even in an "0 g" environment are the air molecules not "statistically weighted" towards the side of the room with the strongest gravitational pull? Seeing that gravity has unlimited range this means there would always be some type of gradient of pressure no matter how small.
You don't need to have gravity for the pressure in a system to vary spatially, such as by having all the gas in half the room.
However, it us useful to think of entropy generation as related to smoothing out of velocity-, temperature-, and concentration gradients.
 

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