A frazzled theoretical physicist reckons that all conservation laws are obeyed in the decay of a proton into a neutron, positron, and neutrino (as in β⁺ decay of a nucleus) and sends a paper to a journal to announce the reaction as a possible end of the universe due to the spontaneous decay of protons.

(a) What energy is released in this decay? 

(b) What is unreasonable about this result?

(c) What assumption is responsible?