Indeed, when I think about motion, I think about harnessable energy, the equivalent of wind or hydroelectric energy but for the micro world! But then if particles pop in and out of existence, couldn't we, in theory, somehow capture the energy they create, and thus defeat the law of entropy?!
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They aren't real particles, they are quantum effects at vacuum state displaying properties of real particles and thus are called "virtual particles", they pop in and out of existence because they exist for a very short period of time - Heisenberg's uncertainty principle for energy and time.
They don't create the energy, it's the energy inherent to them, this energy is called zero-point energy or vacuum energy or Free energy of space. So, i suppose you mean harnessing this zero-point energy.
I suppose you mean harnessing the zero-point energy to defeat the first law of thermodynamics. The first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy) is more fundamental and inclined to what you may be suggesting than entropy (second law of thermodynamics) - a more macroscopic phenomenon. As a matter of fact, if you can design a machine that violates the first law of thermodynamics, then you can have what you are looking for - perpetual motion.
Yes, there have been attempts to harness the zero-point energy or the free energy of space just as you thought about it, see here but for now nothing has been shown experimentally to violate the first law of thermodynamics. Even if it's possible to harness the zero-point energy, some unknown principle can still make your machine not behave like a perpetual motion kind - the machine would eventually stop, this is to prevent violating the first law of thermodynamics. However, research is still on going, it could be that we are still lacking in our understanding of how the universe actually operates - actually we do.
Interesting stuff! And thanks for the detailed reply.
I wasn't too sure what I meant cos I have very superficial knowledge of all this. I was taking what you wrote and thinking about it macroscopically: If I had a piece of land where stuff popped in and out of existence all the time, I could create some way to capture the energy they would inevitably create. It's silly, but that's why I asked, and since people are actually trying it I guess it's not totally off the rails!