Real-world numbers for WoT?

[Elheru Aran]

Okay, this is something that's been pestering me for awhile...

What amount of power, in real life, would be necessary to create some of the physical effects of channeling the One Power? Things like Compulsion and telekinesis, of course, are too "magical" to really be applicable; but in cases where the OP is used to affect the physical world, I think this can be measured... I'm wanting to get an idea of how much power is necessary to do what has been done. I've got a few examples here (they're off the top of my head-- might be wrong in a few details, but i probably have them mostly correct).

#1-- the Asha'man exploding head-sized rocks in training. We don't know what kind of rock would be used, but probably it was fairly common-- for the purposes of this post, let's say granite or basalt?

#2-- the Asha'man exploding people during Dumai's Wells. I don't think they were exploding the entire bodies of the Shaido warriors-- probably just the torsos. I don't know how they'd be doing this, but I figure it was probably by flash-boiling the blood to steam, or some such. How much internal psi would be involved here? I'm not thinking complete destruction, btw... that'd be just a bit impractical, given that it'd use much more of the OP than just blowing a person's torso to pieces.

#3-- Lews Therin Telamon's creation of the Dragonmount in his death. I don't know if Dragonmount is volcanic, but it is definitely described as a mountain. He did so by channeling enormous amounts of power (enormous even for the Age of Legends)-- so much that he destroyed himself. However, terraforming was not too much for the powers of the AoL Aes Sedai; the males who went crazy are described as having raised mountains and made land raise out of the sea, et cetera. Assuming that Dragonmount is a volcano (which would make it somewhat easier to form, due to the swelling magma-- i think?), what would be necessary to do this? Megaton, kiloton-level power?

#4-- lightning-- how could this be done? I know that with this it's a little too magical, but it seems possible to be done with our modern tech. Avoiding issues such as targeting and the like, how much wattage (if any) is necessary to create lightning bolts from the skies to ground, assuming that the catalyst for the lightning bolt is ground-based?

Go ahead and dissect all this to your pleasure... I'm not looking for precise calculations or anything, I just want some general idea of what amounts of power is involved in the examples I've set out.

Fire away!

[Stormbringer]

#2-- the Asha'man exploding people during Dumai's Wells. I don't think they were exploding the entire bodies of the Shaido warriors-- probably just the torsos.

Actually, they did indeed simply blow the bodies apart (among other methods). Perrin's thoughts on the after battle make it pretty clear that they were indeed simply blasting the bodies apart. He doesn't comment that what the Asha'man don't blows them into scraps of bloody meat and of course they also mention that the remains are barely identifiable as bodies.

#3-- Lews Therin Telamon's creation of the Dragonmount in his death. I don't know if Dragonmount is volcanic, but it is definitely described as a mountain.

Actually, it's most definitely an active volcano (probably some what analagous to Hawai's) as there are a number of references to it smoking and that being taken as a bad omen. Not to mention of course the mention of LTT drilling into the "bowels of the earth" included in the suicide scene. I'd say it's most likely a volcano and Lews Therin managed to open up a hotspot in the crust under the Dragonmount.

[Elheru Aran]

Corrections noted... now on to the numbers... please don't overwhelm us with mathematical force-- try to explain it in numbers a 14-year-old with a basic knowledge of algebra could comprehend... thank you!