Re: [Fis] 2004 FIS session: concluding comments

From: Stanley N. Salthe <[email protected]>
Date: Thu 17 Jun 2004 - 00:04:36 CEST

Replying first to Bob, I know that we are generally in agreement on the
basics here, while he doesn't care for my emphasis on the Second Law. The
reason for this emphasis is that it is the principle that poses the most
difficulties for us. We take our own embodiment (a result of a long chain
of influences devolvng from the acceleration of the Big Bang, from
gravitation to the reproduction of organisms) for granted, but are faced
every moment with problems of energy use. Energy shortage, limited energy
efficiency, the damaging effects of strong energy usage, etc. In an
expanding universe embodiment happens, afforded by universal accelerated
expansion, but once embodied, one must struggle with/for/by energy.
Furthermore, given the poor average energy efficiency of work, it seems
reasonable to see that work is being done partly in order to pay the
entropy tax. This is the final cause angle. Of course, there are other
finalities involved in what happens, but this one is always there exerting
a weak but steadily unending pull. For natural philosophy, involved with
uniting all scientific stories, this angle has considerable importance.

And replying to Gyorgy, who wrote wrote:
>> Stan wrote:
> (We can asume that the
> Universe is an isolated system because it could not expand acceleratedly if
> it were not effectively so.)
>...
> Viewed this way, the Second Law is
> a final cause of everything that happens.
>
>> These are contradicting.
>> In fact, thermodynamics looks at the Universe as an isolated
>>system. This is true for its outside boundaries.
>> Yet, it is not isolated "inside". It has many-many subsystems inside.
>>These are not isolated, because they are in a permanent exchange of
>>energy, matter, etc. with their environment, i.e., the rest of the
>>Universe. In turn the "rest of the Universe" has open boundaries
>>(inside). The "Second Law" cannot be applied just in these small (but
>>many) open "subsystems".
>> The curiosity is, that any "emergence" (= "everything that
>>happens") takes place there. In short, all new qualities (like higher
>>hierarchical level physical structures, biological molecules, living
>>matter (cells), etc.) emerge just where one cannot apply the Second Law
>>in the lack of the closure/isolation condition.

     SS replying: Well, I have a probem with this. These subsystems are
subsystems of the whole. They are not isolated, true, but the effects of
the Second Law are still felt in these subsystems, as Prigogine noted when
he described dS/dt >0 as the thermodynamic requirement within each of them.
That is, entropy production is the vicar of the Second Law within each of
the non-isolated parts of the isolated system containing them. If entropy
is produced in a subystem which is not isolated from the supersystem, then
it moves into the sink provided by that system. Put otherwise, if the
Universe was not isolated and out-of-equilibrium, no entropy production
would be required locally in the non-isolated subsystems. Viewed this way,
it is clear that the Second Law can stll be taken as a final cause for all
emergences in local systems (given that energy eficiency is so poor).

>>In philosophical terms the Universe "evolves" due to the existence of
>>subsystems, where the conditions of the Second Law do not prevail.
     OK, but where the associated requirement for postive entropy
production does prevail!

STAN

>On Tue, 15 Jun 2004, Stanley N. Salthe wrote:
>
>> As a philosopher of nature, I would like to again present my view
>> of the BIG picture here. ( So far, no physicists I have presented this
>> to have objected.) We have two basic tendencies in Nature --
>> collecting/centripetal versus cascading/centrifugal. The first,
>> (historically: decoherence -> strong forces -> gravitation ->
>> organization, all showing increasing 'information') occurred because the
>> acceleration of expansion in the Big Bang has been so great that the
>> system went rapidly out of equilibrium and is still doing that. The
>> collecting is just an aspect of acceleration. The "equal and opposite"
>> reaction of the Universe we call the Second Law of thermodynamics,
>> referring to the tendency of the Universe to regain thermodynamic
>> equilibrium. (We can asume that the Universe is an isolated system
>> because it could not expand acceleratedly if it were not effectively
>> so.)
>
>Stan, An excellent encapsulation of the "dialectical" nature of the living
>universe! I will only add that these opposing propensities, as the occur
>in ecosystem trophic networks, can be quantified using information -
>theoretic indices. (Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective. Columbia
>University Press, 1997.)
>
>> Inasmuch as effective work cannot be done with much greater energy
>> efficiency than about 50% on average, it is clear that the production of
>> organization and order through this route is yet another way to help the
>> Universe on its way toward equilibrium. Viewed this way, the Second Law
>> is a final cause of everything that happens.
>
>As the two of us have discussed many times before, however, I do not agree
>that the order- creating propensities must be considered ontologically
>subservient to the tendencies of the Second Law. As with all dialectical-
>like configurations, causality should be considered intractably mutual.
>(Is gravity *subservient* to the Second Law?)
>
>> So, we are less than maximally accelerated substance, sometimes called
>> 'negentropy'.
>
>My preference is away from considering living entities as "substance" and
>favors more the notion of "configurations of processes". (As Popper put
>it, "... we are not things, but flames ... nets of chemical
>*processes* ...")
>
>Furthermore, I tend to eschew Schroedinger's term "negentropy", because it
>maintains one's focus on entropy as the primary attribute and because it
>refers to a state, rather than to an amalgamation of processes.
>
>Bob

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Received on Wed Jun 16 22:33:40 2004

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