Has Hell Frozen Over?

A couple of years ago I spent a few days' surfing in Barbados courtesy of Zed Layson of Zed's Surfing Adventures. A wonderful island with some great waves and, in Zed, a top bloke (pictured here courtesy of Cornwall-based snapper Kirstin Prisk). Indeed, Zed gave me the inspiration for Surf Nation, and appears within its at-last-nearly-finished-and-typeset pages. Meanwhile, he sends me this remarkable piece of conjecture on the nature of Hell. Check it out - Hell is certainly not in Barbados, but did this university student find the answer?

The following is apparently an actual question given on a University of Liverpool chemistry final exam. The answer by one student was so profound that his astonished professor shared it with colleagues via the internet, which is why we now have the privilege of enjoying it as well.

Question: Is Hell exothermic [gives off heat] or endothermic [absorbs heat]?

Most students reportedly wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's law that gas cools when it expands or heats when it is compressed. One student, however, ventured the following answer:

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 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. Boyle's law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay constant, the volume of Hell must expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives rise to 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 Hells breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the rate at which souls enter 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 Sandra 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 No. 2 must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is endothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over it follows that it is not accepting souls anymore and is extinct - leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a Divine Being. This would also explain why, last night, Sandra kept shouting "Oh my God."

Zed tells me that this student received the only 'A' grade.

Comments

[Beach Bum]

.. it will by the time you get that link up to me you promised ;)

Cheers,
Beach Bum

[Daniel Crockett]

I enjoyed that...

Good luck with your book Alex. BTW, I've been trying to mail you about something quite exciting happening this summer, but my mail has been returned...

Hope all's good,

Dan

[alf alderson]

He only got an A? They should have made him head of a new religion - it's one I'd certainly sign up for!