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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Parody of the laws of thermodynamics

Ginsberg's theorem is an epigrammatic paraphrase and parody "theorem" which restates or analogizes the consequences of the four laws of thermodynamics of physics in terms of a person playing a game. It has various formulations, but it can be more or less expressed as:

Ginsberg's theorem: —There is a game, which you are already playing. (consequence of zeroth law of thermodynamics)<br>You cannot win in the game. (consequence of first law of thermodynamics)<br>You cannot break even in the game. (consequence of second law of thermodynamics)<br>You cannot even quit the game. (consequence of third law of thermodynamics)

The theorem is named after the poet Allen Ginsberg, though there does not appear to be any concrete evidence that Ginsberg himself coined the theorem. The phrase is sometimes stated as a general adage without specific reference to the laws of thermodynamics.[1][2][3]

History<br>[edit]

A comprehensive history and etymology of the epigrammatic phrase can also be found from the etymologist Barry Popik.[4]

The phrase is often attributed to the British scientist C. P. Snow, who apparently was credited by his students for using it to help learn the laws of thermodynamics in the 1950s. However this claim appears to be without a source.

A semblance of the phrase appears to have been first printed in a 1953 issue of the science fiction magazine Astounding Science Fiction, whose editor, John Wood Campbell Jr., referenced acoustic engineer and professor Dwight Wayne Batteau of Harvard University:[5]

“You can't win.” (The Law of Conservation of Energy.) “You can't even break even.” (Second Law of Thermodynamics.) When you stop to think about it, that “You can't win,” bears a strong resemblance to the old moral adage “You can't get something for nothing.”\""},"author":{"wt":"— John W. Campbell, Jr."},"source":{"wt":"Intelligence Test, ''Astounding SCIENCE FICTION'', 1953 November, Vol. LII (52), no. 3 (November), pg. 8"},"align":{"wt":"none"}},"i":0}}]}'>

"I suggest that there are some laws of ethics that are not human, but Universal. Wayne Batteau and his Speculative Society group at Harvard sent me one little pair of statements that are decidedly revealing in that respect.<br>“You can't win.” (The Law of Conservation of Energy.)<br>“You can't even break even.” (Second Law of Thermodynamics.)<br>When you stop to think about it, that “You can't win,” bears a strong resemblance to the old moral adage “You can't get something for nothing.”"

— John W. Campbell, Jr., Intelligence Test, Astounding SCIENCE FICTION, 1953 November, Vol. LII (52), no. 3 (November), pg. 8

In a 1956 issue of the same magazine, Batteau himself expanded it further in what appears to have been the first complete mention of the epigrammatic phrase in print:[6]

1. You can't win. 2. You can't even break even. 3. Furthermore, you can't get out of the game!\""},"author":{"wt":"— Wayne Batteau"},"source":{"wt":"English Translation, ''Astounding SCIENCE FICTION'', 1956 December, Vol. LVIII (58), no. 4 (December), pg. 43"},"align":{"wt":"none"}},"i":0}}]}'>

"The Three Laws of Thermodynamics, translated from Mathematics into English, come out:<br>1. You can't win.<br>2. You can't even break even.<br>3. Furthermore, you can't get out of the game!"

— Wayne Batteau, English Translation, Astounding SCIENCE FICTION, 1956 December, Vol. LVIII (58), no. 4 (December), pg. 43

It was later presented in the literary magazine The Kenyon Review in a 1960 short story titled "Entropy" from widely-regarded novelist Thomas Pynchon, who was still then an engineering physics undergraduate at Cornell University:[7]

"Callisto had learned a mnemonic device for remembering the Laws of Thermodynamics: you can't win, things are going to get worse before they get better, who says they're going to get better."

— Thomas Pynchon, Entropy, The Kenyon Review, 1960 April, Vol. XXII (22), no. 2 (Spring), pg. 282

Physicist William R. Corliss also partly wrote about the phrase in a 1964 educational booklet freely distributed by the United States Atomic Energy Commission to disseminate knowledge about atomic energy to the American public:[8]

"The Law of Conservation of Energy and Mass is also called the First Law of Thermodynamics. It is related to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which also governs energy transformations. The Second Law says, in effect, that some energy will unavoidably be lost in all heat engines. The first two laws of thermodynamics have been paraphrased as (1) You can't win; (2) You can't even break even."

— William R. Corliss, Direct Conversion of Energy, United States Atomic Energy Commission, 1974 January, pg. 8

Science writer Isaac Asimov stated at least the first two laws in a 1970 article, and was...