If energy can neither be created nor destroyed then what happens to it?

Answer 1

Technically it didn't come from anywhere because it always existed.

The western philosophy would say god created the energy. That is, he is not a part of this world, he is eternal, and therefore separate from our "space" therefore he created the rules.

However, in eastern Philosophy people like Shankara or Lao Tzu would both say that this world is only a "waiting room" in a sense and we energies are here for only a short period of time before we return to the everlasting pool of The Tao (Lao Tzu) or Brahman (shankara).

As for a scientific explanation - I don't think scientists have an explanation for this. Maybe one day they will but for now i guess you have a choice as to where you think it comes from. Western, Eastern, or simply it always existed as stated above in the other response.

My only problem with "it has always existed" is, what existed before it? and who created it? and how can something just always exist? there has to be someone who "births" it. Not saying its god but more along the lines of something isn't created from nothing and some unknown force of which i don't have any knowledge of must have created it.

DUDE GOD HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ENERGY.

Dude, God has everything to do with energy. All energy was created by God in the beginning.

OK then who gave energy to god? source plzzzzz ....(scientific answer plzzz)

No energy to God, God doesn't need it. God needs nothing, we are God's worshipers. Also, I think that energy was at first created by God because we need something to keep us going, God doesn't. God is infinite, never created and God will never end. How can this be, because time itself wasn't there, God made time. You get it.

The original question - all theological debates aside - is actually a fundamental question of physics. The prevailing theory at this time has energy and mass coming into existence with "the Big Bang". According this theory, prior to the existence of the universe as we now know it, what would become the universe existed in an extremely "hot" and "dense" state as some kind of singularity. The words hot and dense are in quotes here because size and mass and temperature are concepts based on the current state of the universe (as is time for that matter) and have no real meaning prior to the existence of the universe. Note that the Big Bang theory does not and cannot provide any explanation for such an initial condition; rather, it describes and explains the general evolution of the universe going forward from that point on. From this point of view, the question reduces to "What existed before anything existed?" As can be seen from the preceding debates, some people answer this with "God".

See the related links to information that some people consider relevant.

Answer 2

In most processes high grade energy like chemical or electrical energy is used to make some product, which may itself contain a lot of energy, like gasoline for example, but in the process some low grade energy will be lost to the environment.

A good example is in power plants where the energy from burning coal or uranium is converted to useful electrical energy, but the process also involves rejecting a large amount of low temperature heat which disappears into the cooling water and eventually to the ocean or to the atmosphere via cooling towers. Ultimately all energy used finds its way into the environment-it is still there but not noticeable in the overall heat balance of the earth, which is a balance between receiving energy from the sun and radiating it back into space.

As far as creation of energy goes, the coal or uranium has the energy locked up in it, we don't create the energy but enable it to be released by burning it. The chemical energy locked up in the coal was originally derived from the sun's energy millions of years ago, through growth of vegetation. Uranium was formed billions of years ago in stellar processes, and ultimately we get back to the Big Bang when everything started-best not to go there unless you are Stephen Hawking!

Answer 3

That's really an interesting question, but unfortunately, one to which we (mankind) currently have no answers. All the mass/energy which is currently in the Universe was there from what is normally considered as the start - the Big Bang. It is currently unknown what came before that - or whether there even was a "before". Nor is it known what caused the Big Bang, or where the mass/energy came from.

Answer 4

all our energy comes from the sun in one way or another

Answer 5

There are theories that when the universe was born in the big bang, the intense mass of all the matter released was converted into energy via nuclear fission/fusion.