Re: [Fis] 2004 FIS session: concluding comments

From: Gyorgy Darvas <darvasg@helka.iif.hu>
Date: Thu 17 Jun 2004 - 09:23:05 CEST

At 17:04 2004. 06. 16.istory. -0500, STAN wrote:

    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).

The case is, that in open subsystems ***entropy may locally decrease***!!!
Emerging (sub)systems and living systems are such (i.e., in a non-equilibrium state).
(E.g., protein synthesis)
This fact does not contrdict to the "Second Law".

>>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!

Does not. See above.
(The Second Law is valid everywhere. However, the conditions are not everywhere present for its functioning. )

Gyuri

STAN

Symmetry Festival 2003   http://www.conferences.hu/symmetry2003/
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Received on Thu Jun 17 09:27:47 2004