Chronicle April 2009.qxd 07/04/2009 16:01 Page 9
The following is an actual question given on a University of Liverpool chemistry
final exam. Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs
heat)?
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s law that gas cools
when it expands and heats when it is compressed or some variant.
One student, however, wrote the following:
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 that 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. Because 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 two
possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell,
then the temperature and pressure will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in 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 number 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 any more souls and is extinct…..leaving only Heaven, thereby proving
the existence of a divine being – which explains why, last night Sandra kept
shouting “Oh my God”
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED THE ONLY “A”.
John Hobson
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