CHAPTER III. 

 ON THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A UNIVERSE. 



It is now possible to renew the discussion postponed from 

 page 224 as to whether or not the universe is losing its avail- 

 able energy and is going steadily to a condition of rest and 

 extinction; whether or not the universe is a clock running 

 down. Only yesterday, practically, the affirmative side of 

 this question seemed to be one of the safest and surest con- 

 clusions of modern science. But we have seen more than one 

 of these long-accepted generalizations seriously impugned 

 and it may be that, in the light of this new knowledge, we 

 shall find that this widely accepted dictum of science, that 

 the universe is proceeding fatally to the extinction of its 

 available energy, is also a legitimate matter of deliberate 

 question. 



The reasons for this current conception have seemed, until 

 recently, irrefragable. In the words of Mr. A. Daniell, "In 

 every Transformation of Energy we find that some Energy 

 is wasted through conversion into Heat, the result, direct or 

 indirect, of friction, noise, flashes of light, and so on. This 

 heat is presently distributed pretty uniformly among its 

 surrounding objects, and can no more be made use of by 

 us for the sake of producing work. A large quantity of the 

 Energy of the Universe must have already assumed this 

 relatively useless condition, and in the course of time the 

 whole of the Energy in the Universe will have assumed it. 

 The Energy of the Universe is a constant amount, some of 

 16 * (241) 



