perpetual motionn.
/pəˈpɛtʃʊəl ˈməʊʃn/, /pəˈpɛtʃ(ᵿ)l ˈməʊʃn/, /pəˈpɛtjʊəl ˈməʊʃn/, /pəˈpɛtjᵿl ˈməʊʃn/, U.S. /pərˈpɛtʃ(əw)əl ˈmoʊʃ(ə)n/ 1. Motion that goes on for ever; a state of movement or activity that appears to be continuous and unceasing.
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the world > movement > [noun] > perpetual motion
perpetual motion1566
perpetuum mobile1953
1566 N. Sanders Supper of Our Lord (new ed.) iii. f. 135v Our nature is not at any certain state, but continueth in his substance by perpetuall motion, drawing to it that which it lacketh, and expelling superfluouse things.
1593 G. Harvey Pierces Supererogation 188 Entelechy..shewing whence they [sc. divine minds] came by their heauenly and perpetuall motion.
1611 in T. Coryate Crudities sig. b3 He is alwaies Tongue-Maior of the company, and if euer the perpetuall motion be to be hoped for, it is from thence.
1708 Brit. Apollo 19–21 May The Miller's Clacks and the Lawyer's Clacks are in perpetual Motion.
1922 J. Joyce Ulysses iii. xvii. [Ithaca] 688 Carried westward, forward and rereward respectively, by the proper perpetual motion of the earth.
1998 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 19 Feb. 11/2 Such blunders helped to create a dynamic of atrocity and counter-atrocity that kept the conflict in perpetual motion.
2. spec. The motion of a machine which runs for ever once set going, without any further input of energy, unless stopped by an external force or through wearing out; (also, now rare) a mechanism of this kind. In later use frequently attributive.Although the search for such a machine was long considered futile, the formulation of the law of conservation of energy and the second law of thermodynamics in the 19th cent. established its impossibility.The law of conservation of energy means that no machine can do useful work without using energy; or equivalently, that a machine cannot produce more energy than it uses.The second law of thermodynamics means that heat cannot be completely converted into other forms of energy.
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a1626 F. Bacon New Atlantis (1900) 43 We have divers curious Clocks;..And some Perpetuall Motions.
1646 Sir T. Browne Pseudodoxia Epidemica v. xviii. 260 To attempt perpetuall motions, and engines whose revolutions..might outlast the exemplary mobility, and outmeasure time it selfe. View more context for this quotation
c1660 J. Evelyn Diary anno 1644 (1955) II. 230 He with Dutch patience shew'd us his perpetual motions, Catoptrics, Magnetical experiments.
1702 T. Savery Miner's Friend 80 I know the Notions of the Perpetual Motion, or Self-moving Engine.
1837 C. Dickens Pickwick Papers xliii. 463 The have-his-carcase, next to the perpetual motion, is vun o' the blessedest things as wos ever made.
1859 G. A. Sala Gaslight & Daylight xvi. 174 So with the circle-squarers, perpetual motion discoverers.
1892 Dict. Nat. Biogr. at Lloyd, David Lloyd..devised ‘perpetual motion’ engines.
1968 Brit. Jrnl. Psychiatry 114 1479/2 If telekinesis is a fact, then nothing stands in the way of the perpetual motion machine.
2001 High Country News 23 Apr. 10/1 Light-burners belonged with perpetual motion mechanics and spoon-bending psychics.
Derivatives
perpetual ˈmotionist n. a person who believes in the possibility of building a perpetual motion machine, or who attempts to design or build one.
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1779 J. Watt Let. 2 Dec. in E. Robinson & D. McKie Partners in Sci. (1970) 74 Cumming has certainly exposed himself by having anything to do with Perpetual Motionists.
1872 A. De Morgan Budget of Paradoxes 342 A perpetual motionist wanted to explain his method.
1994 Skeptical Inquirer (Nexis) 22 June 372 Newman is the most famous of the current crop of perpetual motionists.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2005; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1566