Comment: - Some e-mail on the Second Law of Thermodynamics?
>You say that the earth and universe are not closed systems.
>However, the second law reflects what happens in a closed system.
>This law reflects what happens in the universe and on earth. If we simply
>look around at what we observe, we see that things are moving from
>a state of order to a state of disorder. So, the universe must be a closed
>system. What is the support of it being an open system?
Both in the case of the law of conservation of energy (mass is a form of energy)
and the case of the second law of thermodynamics, a CLOSED system is one
through whose boundaries no energy can pass. The second law of
thermodynamics applies ONLY to CLOSED systems.
Examples:
(1) A person is not
a closed system -- so the body can and does increase its
order at the expense of greater disorder in outside objects such as food,
usually from other living plants and animals. When a person dies his order
decreases and viruses, bacteria, etc. increase their order at the expense of
the person's body.
(2) The same with a cell in your body -- it is not usually a close system.
(3) The same with
certain organic and inorganic chemical reactions
-- molecules build to become more complex, thus increasing their order,
by receiving energy from the outside -- in the natural world a molecule
is not a closed system. In labs experiment, chemical reactions, etc. are
often forced to be closed systems.
(4) Snowflakes with
their six-sided crystalline symmetry are formed
spontaneously from randomly moving water vapour molecules (disorder to order).
Salts with precise planes of crystalline symmetry form spontaneously when
water evaporates from a solution (disorder to order). Seeds sprout into
flowering plants and eggs develop into chicks (disorder to order).
These are not closed systems.
(5) The Earth is
not a closed system.
It receives energy from the sun, which allows organic molecules to become
more ordered at the expense of more disorder in the sun. Since the sun
radiates the energy from nuclear reactions, it can be calculated that the
sun will supply the earth with energy for at least another 5 billion years.
This is a long time for the earth to not be a closed system.
This allows life to continue to evolve (increase order) for many billions of years
yet. After that, if there is no other source of energy outside the earth
(e.g. the stars) then the earth would become more of a closed system and
we would see that things on earth would have a net movement from a
state of order to a state of disorder.
(4) and (5) above are the important ones for evolution. So there is nothing
in the second law of thermodynamics that contradicts evolution.
(6) According to
the General Theory of Relativity the Universe could either
be (1) finite or closed, and therefore in a time much longer than the sun will
last (billions of years) all order will turn to disorder; or (2) open and infinite.
The latest evidence indicates that the Universe is open and infinite.
Astronomical evidence indicates that there has to be 100 times as much mass
as is observed to make the universe closed. Yet, cosmologists are looking for
the 'missing' matter to make up for this 100.
For the life of me, I cannot see how creationists can discredit the fact of evolution
by using this law. I have yet to see a law of Physics that does discredit it.
>I simply have not seen any support for the universe being infinite
>and an open system.
This is the weak part of my argument related to the second law of thermodynamics
(or The Law of Entropy). At this stage of astronomy, astronomers do not know
for sure if the universe is open or close, but the latest evidence has made
cosmetologists confident that it is. However, for an argument against evolution,
the part of my last e-mail that dealt with the universe isn't important.
The earth is still not a closed system therefore you can't
use the second
law of thermodynamics to discredit evolution. This was my main point.
Before we leave the topic of evolution, I saw a science documentary on TV
about the recent development in computer programming which uses evolution
-- copying the evolutionary processes in nature -- 100's of programs start
interacting with an environment and each other with random mutations
occurring in the programs -- programmers set up the environment,
the rate of mutations and let the evolutionary process do it's thing.
It has been found that evolutionary program development is much more
efficient than programming from design, and more satisfactory and better
solutions happen faster than programming from design. Not only do you get
an interesting variety of programs to cope with a set problem or a set
of problems, but you get procedures and results that humans would never
have imagined. Some of the novel solutions are better than anything humans
would have designed. The computer science researchers said they were
very surprised at the good results of this new process.
One researcher wondered why this process hadn't been tried before.
If you see any information on evolutionary programming on the internet,
let me know the internet address. I would imagined maintaining the
environment (which would be changing from the effects of the programs in it),
and running many programs at once would take a lot of computer memory.
I thought this was the reason it was only being done in Universities with
massive computing power (I think one was MIT?). I've tried evolutionary
programming on my limited Pentium and find it is also efficient and actually
possible. My various evolutionary programs involve such things as the evolution
of geometric shapes, the evolution of other programs using certain environmental
restrictions,
>the second law of thermodynamics states that things go from complex to
>simple, from maximum concentration of energy to maximum ñn other words,
>things are running down. Time flows one direction.
The second Law of Thermodynamics applies to a closed system.
The Earth is, of course, part of a much larger system -- the rest
of the solar system and beyond. So, throughout earth's history living things
have evolved from the simple to the complex by the use of solar energy.
By making some parts of the larger system less complex, resulted in making
the living things on earth more complex over hundreds of millions of years.
>If nothing creates itself and something created exists (i.e. it can be demonstrated
it had a moment of creation, such as through degenerating), unless you are
willing to deny the evidence there is a creator. He is God.
Recent (last few years) astronomical evidence suggests the 'Big Bang'
Cosmological Theory has some major problems -- it has difficulty explaining
the evidence. There are super structures of galaxies that cannot have been
formed by gravity in only 10 to 20 billion years, as the theory predicts.
The latest astronomical data tends to show the universe is much older then
that -- that the universe is an open system that may extend forever.
Since the second law of thermodynamics applies only to a closed system,
it does not apply to the universe as a whole. I would even guess from the
evidence that the universe has always existed. With all the new and better
telescopes coming into operation all over the world, the next 20 years or so
will be very interesting in astronomy.
>the second law of thermodynamics states that things go from complex to
>simple, from maximum concentration of energy to maximum diffusion of
>energy and a state of equilibrium. In other words, things are running down.
>Time flows one direction.
>Everything degenerates: no one is born old and grows young.
I have answered part of this in my last e-mail.
The future:
Based on the expansion of the universe that we can see with our telescopes
(assuming the Big Bang is correct and that it is a closed system) it would take
many times longer for the universe to run down than 20 billion years.
The time depends on the RATE OF THE rate of expansion that is happening now.
From the data I have seen I would bet on the universe being infinite in expanse
and eternal in time.
(1) On the Second Law: This is much used by creationists to support their
position. I think you are right on when you say that
"The Earth is, of course, part of a much larger system..."
Now: does the Second Law apply to the Universe?
I have trouble with the word 'Universe', and my failure to understand it is
in many ways similar to my problems with the word 'God". It seems clear
to me that the Universe, however defined, is not a thing.
It is logically of a different order from any of the things that are in the Universe
-- or, if you prefer, the universe. Does the Second Law apply to it?
I will await further findings before coming to an opinion