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A comment on Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds. Parent comment

Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by gojomo on Thursday October 24, 2013 @02:20PM (#6606923)
The headline writer is simply speaking figuratively, for maximum effect in constrained space. This is easily understood by a general audience, but sometimes misunderstood by the extra-literal/extra-critical mindset often seen in HN threads.

In the headline, 'Microwave' stands synecdochally for 'microwave oven' and then also for the more-general category 'fast-heating appliance'.

When there are multiple ways to interpret something, assume the interpretation that credits the writer/speaker with some sense, not an interpretation that is most-literal or most-amenable as the setup for an insult.

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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by Amadou on Thursday October 24, 2013 @02:44PM (#6607084)
I voted you up for truth.

But... don't discount the profound disappointment that a headline like that generates in those of us who do know how a microwave works. We were teased with the idea of learning something we thought would alter our understanding of the universe -- some sort of microwave version of the peltier effect[1] -- only to find out it was something as pedestrian as poetic license.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoelectric_effect

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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by waps on Thursday October 24, 2013 @03:30PM (#6607341)
Those who know physics would hopefully know that a cooling microwave would be a blatant violation of the second law of thermodynamics.
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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by cookingrobot on Thursday October 24, 2013 @06:27PM (#6608445)
No it wouldn't - as long as the device, target and environment heat up as a whole. For ex, laser cooling where a laser reflects off a surface with more energy than it started with.
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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by Amadou on Thursday October 24, 2013 @05:25PM (#6608088)
Oddly enough, your response is basically the same sort of overly-narrow literalism that gojomo was complaining about, just from the other direction.
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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by serf on Thursday October 24, 2013 @07:00PM (#6608638)
No, it's not.

"reverse microwave" is correct in a sense, because as gojomo pointed out, the author meant it as a way to convey the concept of "rapid-heating appliance".

"You can't do x because of thermodynamics" actually was incorrect, and didn't take into account multiple specific instances which show that closed systems can create such results.

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Re:Reverse Microwave Chills Beer In 45 Seconds by jsilence on Thursday October 24, 2013 @04:42PM (#6607805)
In soviet russia...

SCNR

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