ELI5-What is entropy?

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ELI5-What is entropy?

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Picture a simple rollercoaster with hills and valleys all at different heights to one another but the beginning and end are the highest points on it. Entropy says no matter what happens, eventually the coaster will settle into the lowest valley available. Sure, if given a push it can be moved uphill to another higher valley and settle there, but even then eventually due to random chance (a freak gust of wind, a branch falls and pushes the cart just the right way) the cart will inevitably get back to the bottom. It’s happiest there. Once there, there is literally zero chance of it getting any lower and it takes effort to do anything else. Everywhere else on the rollercoaster there is some chance, no matter how small that it could move to the lowest point. This inexorable pull towards the lowest energy state possible is entropy.

What this inevitably translates to is everything in the universe that is at an elevated energy state will decay. Your made bed gets disheveled, Buildings crumble, metal rusts, atoms decay, black holes evaporate, and so on until eventual the entire universe is one homogeneous thermodynamically neutral medium where there is literally no more rollercoaster to coast.

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