encryption algorithm

[Robert J. Hansen]

> Well, probably not - because in order to apply this energy to your
> brute-force calculation process you presumably have some way of
> capturing it, thereby making it unavailable for use in the destruction
> of the cosmos.  :-)

Nope!  That thermodynamic analysis is how much heat you have to dump  
in the universe.  (Well, entropy, actually, but to a first  
approximation that's the same thing.)  For more details, check  
Wikipedia's writeup on the Landauer bound:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landauer%27s_principle

So, yeah, it really is as catastrophic as I make it out to be.  :)