"Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle..." True or not?
 

"Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared." Siddhartha Gautama

Nice quote, right? But is it true? Seems like there would be extra energy consumed in lighting another candle, which WOULD shorten the life of the source candle. What do you think?

Of course, if never lit, the life of a candle is going to be a looootttt longer.

Happiness's life cycle runs counter to basic physics - the more it's shared, the longer it lives.

Holy ****! A whole topic about my signature.

Here's another:
If something is to be done, one should proceed firmly. The inattentive practitioner is more scattered than the dust.

As for the real question.... Id say its true. The energy is already being released, you're just harnessing it by lighting the other candles.

True, but it pisses off your electric company and is probably against fire codes.

And causes a lot of soot to build up on the walls ans ceilings.

BS...everytime you turn a candle on it's side to light another, you will dump a bunch of wax. also the flame will "touch" more wax and cause it to melt and drip.

i think you do shorten it's life.

Good Grasshopper, but what if you leave lit candle upright and turned the candle being lit?

Shared pain is lessened, shared joy is increased.

Up in this neck of the woods right now this is called survival!

(unless you have a generator... :D )

By the way... "It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness."

More fun to get drunk and light a fart though...

I'm sure it's true, from a physics standpoint: the single burning candle is releasing heat (and light) energy into the room. If you light another candle from the flame, you would be using a bit of that heat energy to light the wick on the fresh candle, rather than the room. So the energy loss would be noticed in the room's temperature (though it would be an infinitesimally small loss.

Thing is, the metaphorical equivalent is true. The "happiness" given off by a lone individual would be just increasing the happiness content of an empty room, if not shared.

damn! missed the pebbles again obi-wan.

candle0 will always be burning wax and giving off heat at Rate0. If you only touch candle(n+1)'s wick to the candle(n-1)'s flame and not the wick, you will only be using the already expelled energy off candle(n-1).


Case: Light candle0. arrange candle1 to candle1000 by lining their wicks together and lighting them all at once. ever lit awhole matchbook?

I'm not sure, but I do know you can set a baby grand piano on fire through careless menorah management during Hanukkah.

You can also catch a bathroom on fire by drunkenly igniting 40-50lbs of fireworks in the tub. Why, the good ol days of college....

Oh no, lite a 1000 candles and can you imagine the effects on GLOBAL WARMING. Please don't do this ya'll, because we all want to live another few years before the sea's rise up and engulf the earth. Just think of the children, or no, no, no.

Quoting The Buddha?

Isn't "lighting a thousand candles off a single candle" a great model for a functioning economic system.
The pie model limits the economy to a static quantity where the candle metaphor has unlimited potential for growth and everyone who offers a candle can live in the light.
In the candle model there is no need to "redistribute" candles in order for everyone to share in the light.

In the economic metaphor the candle is your labor.