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what is energy and does it self organize

• What is energy? Is energy in a lightning bolt, does it come out of a chemical reaction, is it the momentum of the earth? If energy comes in different forms please explain them. Does energy self organize? In the wake of the big bang did energy self organize into quarks? Did lightning organize matter into amino acids so that life could begin? Is it something inherit in energy that causes it to organize things?

• Answer:

  Hi defactopkmf, and thanks for the chance to work on this interesting question! Let's start with the first part... "What is energy?" From Oneworld.net's 'What is Energy' page (a really good introduction to the basics, including sections called "where does it come from?", "what does it do?", and "why do we need it?") @ ( http://www.oneworld.org/energy/plain/whatis.htmlFrom ): "Everything in the universe is either energy or matter. Einstein realized that one could become the other and vice versa, immortalized in his famous equation E=mc2. E is energy, m is mass (matter) and c is the velocity of light. It means that energy and matter are equivalent. This understanding is the basis of nuclear bombs and power in which matter is changed to energy. For us humans, energy is the means for doing work. Picking up a book, watching TV or launching a Space Shuttle all need energy. Without it there would be no life, for all life uses energy." And where do we get energy (i.e. what are the various sources of energy?) From "What is Energy?”, a great site aimed at kids, but great for us adults, by the US Energy Information Administration ( http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/whatsenergy.html ): "These sources are divided into two groups -- renewable (an energy source that we can use over and over again) and nonrenewable (an energy source that we are using up and cannot recreate in a short period of time)." (For specific information about which sources fall into which category, click on the words "renewable" and "nonrenewable" on that page.) And how do we receive and store energy? From that same site: "It comes in different forms -- heat (thermal), light (radiant), mechanical, electrical, chemical, and nuclear energy. There are two types of energy -- stored (potential) energy and working (kinetic) energy. For example, the food you eat contains chemical energy, and your body stores this energy until you release it when you work or play." So, the examples you gave in your question use/produce various forms and types of energy. Lightning is the conversion of potential (electrical charges in a storm cloud) to kinetic (a lightning flash) energy, and consists of several forms... thermal, radiant, and electrical. (If we were to harness lightning, we could hypothetically convert it into another form. We do just that with many natural forces now - by harnessing energy from the sun through solar panels, from wind through windmills, from water using dams, etc.) Chemical reactions can certainly produce energy... If you combine two substances and they cause an explosion, you have converted at least some of their potential energy into kinetic energy. The earth's momentum itself does not contain or produce energy. Momentum is a measure of an object's resistance to a change in motion. (For more on the relationship between energy and momentum, see the Boston University Physics Department's page called "Studying Elementary Particles-Velocity, Momentum, and Energy" @ http://physics.bu.edu/ATLAS/guide/energy.html ) If, however, you could harness the potential energy inherent in the motion of the earth, you could convert it to another form, just as with the examples above. Now for the ‘self-organization’ question… First, let’s try to define it. (As it happens, that’s not so easy!) The Principia Cybernetica Web offers this definition (http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SELFORG.html ): “Self-organization is a process where the organization (constraint, redundancy) of a system spontaneously increases, i.e. without this increase being controlled by the environment or an encompassing or otherwise external system.” However, by following the links at the bottom of the page, it becomes clear that there are other proposed definitions. They essentially vary in how much a system’s environment can be a part of the changes it’s undergoing until the system is no longer considered “self-organized.” Since you asked about ‘The Big Bang,’ it’s important to point out that it is still a theory (widely accepted, but a theory nonetheless.) There are many related questions still unanswered, and of course no one knows exactly what happened, so any ‘answer’ to this question in that context will be speculative. With that said, Encyclopedia.com gives some helpful information on it’s Cosmology page under “ The Big-Bang Theory.” (http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/section/cosmolog_ModernCosmologicalTheories.asp): “According to big-bang theories, at the beginning of time, all of the matter and energy in the universe was concentrated in a very dense state, from which it “exploded,” with the resulting expansion continuing until the present… In this initial state, the universe was very hot and contained a thermal soup of quarks, electrons, photons, and other elementary particles … As the universe cooled, the quarks condensed into protons and neutrons, the building blocks of atomic nuclei. Some of these were converted into helium nuclei by fusion; the relative abundance of hydrogen and helium is used as a test of the theory. After many millions of years the expanding universe, at first a very hot gas, thinned and cooled enough to condense into individual galaxies and then stars.” If you agree with Einstein in his theory that matter and energy are related (as mentioned in the beginning of this answer,) some energy may well have converted to matter and vice versa. As you can see in the previous passage, according to The Big-Bang Theory, some of the matter in existence today was created through the kinds of reactions we were introduced to earlier (nuclear, physical/thermal.) It could be said that the capacity for such reactions is ‘inherent’ in energy, as you suggested. Does that mean energy is capable of self-organization? I think the key to answering that question (again, in this context) is answering another question… Was The Big Bang a result of such reactions, or vice versa? The answer… No one knows. (From Thinkquest Library’s “Intro to the Universe” page @ http://library.thinkquest.org/26220/universe/?tqskip1=1&tqtime=0702 , “We do not know exactly what caused the big bang, but we do know what happened fractions of a second after it.” From Spaceboy’s Big Bang page @ http://spaceboy.nasda.go.jp/note/shikumi/e/shi01_e.html , “At the moment the universe was born there was a colossal explosion that scientists refer to as the "Big Bang." This marked the birth of time and space. Yet what caused the Big Bang to occur? The status of the universe 1/100th of a second after the Big Bang is discussed theoretically, but prior to that, nothing is known. And a variety of other theories exist in addition to the Big Bang.” So, I can’t tell you what happened in the Big Bang… But I hope and think I’ve provided you with the kind of information you’re looking for. Please feel free to request clarification if I can be of any further help… and thanks again for the interesting and challenging question! Best, Rebecca The pages I used to answer your questions are full of wonderful, easy to understand information, and there are great pages I didn’t even get to quote! I wish I could have posted it all here! I encourage you to explore them: HowStuffWorks' page on Energy, part of "How Force, Power, Torque and Energy Work," by Karim Nice ( http://www.howstuffworks.com/fpte6.htm ) This page will give you information about in energy in a context that may make it easier to fully understand. What is Energy, a great site for kids by the US Energy Information Administration ( http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/whatsenergy.html ) Edugreen’s page on energy ( http://edugreen.teri.res.in/explore/n_renew/ener.htm ) Encyclopedia.com’s page on energy (http://www.encyclopedia.com/searchpool.asp?target=energy ) Spaceboy’s page on The Big Bang (http://spaceboy.nasda.go.jp/note/shikumi/e/shi01_e.html ) Thinkquest Library’s “Intro to the Universe” page (http://library.thinkquest.org/26220/universe/?tqskip1=1&tqtime=0702 ) The Principia Cybernetica Web’s page on Self Organization (http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SELFORG.html ) I searched for: "what is energy" ( ://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22what+is+energy%22 ) "energy and momentum" ( ://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22energy+and+momentum%22 ) “the big bang” (://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22the+big+bang%22 ) "self-organization" (://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22self%2Dorganization%22 ) "what caused the big bang" (://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=%22what+caused+the+big+bang%22 )