Incidentally, I do like the parents of my kids, almost as much as I like the kids

So, after everyone had started working on the candlesticks, I decided to see if I could get a discussion going on the laws of Shabbat, just for fun and more learning. And, y'know, to get the taste out of my brain.

So said that, by the laws of Shabbat, we weren't supposed to do work on Shabbat, but how did we define "work"?

Obviously, the very first definition suggested was "the cross-product of force and displacement." As, y'know, I expected, and had been planning for.

What can I say? I know my community.

So I said, "Let's explore that notion -- fundamentally, what that comes down to is a definition that work is, at some level of abstraction, the use of energy -- and I think it's clear that, if we accept that definition, then metabolizing would be a violation of Shabbat."

(Just got hit by esprit d'escalier -- I SHOULD have said, "And, as we've established, death is the penalty for NOT following Shabbat, it cannot therefore ALSO be the requirement FOR following Shabbat. . . ")

One of the other parents broke in, "So really, the only way to TRULY follow Shabbat would be to put yourself in a suspended animation chamber? But if you did that, how could you study and read the Torah on Shabbat?"

I nodded. "Yes, and, anyway, while a suspended animation chamber would prevent the use of energy within the closed system of the INSIDE of the chamber, it would have to exist in a larger system, and use energy that way. I don't think that you can avoid disordering energy into heat on Shabbat. Therefore, I think we can safely disregard the physics definition of 'work' here."

The original parent said, "Disregard physics?!? NOOOOOOOOOOOO!"