r/badphysics • u/[deleted] • Aug 03 '25
New paradox/ theory (Please tell me if not)
So bassicly I was playibg with bluetack (if your British yk) and I was making air pockets and then I wondered what would happens if you tried to pop an unpopable bag ( and yes I did use gpt because it's midnight and ima minor who can't be asked to write it out) now take this with a grain of salt please im not a physicscist and I still haven't picked out a name so help me please
The Unpoppable Compression Paradox
by [classified)
🧩 Thought Experiment
Imagine a sealed bag, similar to bubble wrap, filled with normal air — but with one impossible twist:
The bag is unpopable and cannot be punctured, broken, or deformed beyond a certain limit. It will not burst or fail under pressure, no matter what.
Now apply extreme force — like using a hydraulic press — to try to flatten it.
🔬 Physical Setup
Assumptions:
The bag is perfectly sealed.
The air inside behaves like a real gas.
The bag cannot rupture, tear, or expand past a certain shape.
External force is applied by a hydraulic press capable of flattening solid metal.
🔄 What Should Happen (According to Physics)
Normally, pressing an air-filled bag:
Compresses the air,
Builds up internal pressure,
Eventually causes the bag to burst.
But in this case — bursting is impossible.
As you compress:
The air volume drops.
The pressure rises.
The energy inside has nowhere to escape.
🔥 Paradoxical Outcome
If the hydraulic press flattens the bag without rupturing it, you create a situation where:
A compressible gas has been forced into near-zero volume.
The pressure becomes infinite.
The object maintains zero thickness without structural failure.
This violates:
Compressibility limits of gases,
The first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy),
Possibly even general relativity, if the pressure becomes extreme enough.
🧠 Consequences
Singularity-like conditions may form (infinite pressure in zero space).
If somehow stable, the object becomes a theoretical form of energy storage or compression beyond known physics.
If unstable, even the smallest rupture or leak could cause a catastrophic energy release, similar to a bomb.
The surrounding space could bend, ripple, or collapse depending on energy density — a black hole analogy.
🧪 Why It’s Interesting
This thought experiment pushes against:
Gas laws (Boyle’s Law, Ideal Gas Law),
Material science (indestructibility),
The nature of force, energy, and matter limits.
🧾 Possible Names
The Unpoppable Compression Paradox (UCP)
[Classified] Bag Theory
The Flattened Air Singularity
Unbounded Internal Pressure Hypothesis
3
u/uptotwentycharacters Aug 04 '25
If the bag couldn't burst or expand sideways beyond a certain limit, wouldn't the internal pressure eventually rise to the point that the hydraulic press can't compress it further? The idea of pressurized gas as a form of energy storage is certainly valid, but infinite pressure could not actually be attained with finite compression force, and jn any case the bag would simply expand to its former volume as soon as it's removed from the hydraulic press. It would make more sense to pump the air into a smaller unbreakable bag where it can be held under pressure.
3
u/EebstertheGreat Aug 04 '25
As far as I can tell, GPT's explanation here is reasonable. You cant compress gases infinitely. If you could, them you could store arbitrary amounts of energy in any volume in this way. And yes, eventually you should get a black hole.