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Author Topic:   Thermodynamics
Electron
Inactive Member


Message 31 of 159 (184888)
02-13-2005 12:58 PM
Reply to: Message 30 by coffee_addict
02-13-2005 12:30 PM


Going a bit off-topic here, I'll leave it to this paper:
http://www1.cs.columbia.edu/~misra/6717/lecture1.pdf

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mark24
Member (Idle past 5195 days)
Posts: 3857
From: UK
Joined: 12-01-2001


Message 32 of 159 (184896)
02-13-2005 1:45 PM
Reply to: Message 15 by Jordo86
02-13-2005 10:28 AM


Jordo,
Yes but sugar forming from already existing complex elements isnt impressive. The formation of THOSE original building blocks is. Im talking about the formation of the building blocks themselves.
You've missed the point. According to a creationist interpretation of 2LOT, decrease of entropy is impossible, & so is an increase in complexity. This single example scuppers both claims (which is false anyway, were you to read what the 2LOT actually states).
Mark

There are 10 kinds of people in this world; those that understand binary, & those that don't

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JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 33 of 159 (184901)
02-13-2005 2:18 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by Electron
02-13-2005 12:21 PM


Kolmogorov complexity is one method whereby the measure is the minimum number of bits into which a binary representation of the object can be compressed without losing information.
Yup. IIRC Evolution has been shown to increase Kolmogorov complexity, although I don't have the reference to hand. One difficulty with Kolmogorov complexity is that you can calculate bounds on it but you can't calculate it.

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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 34 of 159 (184905)
02-13-2005 2:31 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by JonF
02-13-2005 2:18 PM


thnaks for the info
so it seems to me THEN, that Gladyshev would still be not incorrect to assert we dont have a clear relation of order and complexity and in that end I ONLY find macrothermodyanmics to discount the creationist position IF it were posible to get MORE than the bound even in the open system.
Is the archemidian axiom implicit in the measure?

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JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 35 of 159 (184907)
02-13-2005 2:38 PM
Reply to: Message 29 by NosyNed
02-13-2005 12:26 PM


Re: The difference between K and Shannon?
My memory is fuzzy here but how is that different from Shannon's definition?
It's totally different, and not related. Kolmogorov complexity has to do with compression and the Universal Turing Machine (UTM) that's doing the compressing. Shannon entropy has to do with the probability of a particular string appearing from a particular space of strings.
It sounds like it should be at least related to Shannon information so I'm not sure if it adds anything useful?
About all it adds the the EvC debate is another buzzword for creationists to misunderstand and misapply. There's an interesting thread at For Sean Pitman- more on Kolmogorov Complexity in which R. Baldwin demponstrates that relative to a particular carefully-selected UTM the Kolmogorov complexity of the Encyclopedia Britannica is two bits!!!! Of course, that carefully-selected UTM is a little on the complex side ...
Kolmogorov Complexity has uses in the theory of computing, but not in any investigation about the source of the complexity of life.

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Sylas
Member (Idle past 5260 days)
Posts: 766
From: Newcastle, Australia
Joined: 11-17-2002


Message 36 of 159 (184912)
02-13-2005 3:05 PM
Reply to: Message 5 by Jordo86
02-13-2005 9:05 AM


Re: zygote to adult
Deleted in edit.... Sorry, my point was adequately covered already by others, so I will sit back for now.
This message has been edited by Sylas, 02-13-2005 15:09 AM

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Percy
Member
Posts: 22393
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 37 of 159 (184915)
02-13-2005 3:10 PM
Reply to: Message 16 by Jordo86
02-13-2005 10:30 AM


Jordo86 writes:
Sorry this if my first day on the site so im not surprised that nothing im asking is new.
No need to apologize, and in fact the apology should probably be in the other direction. This discussion board has a number of long timers, and though they should know better, many find it difficult to keep from becoming frustrated as patterns like this occur:
A newly arrived Creationist says, "The 2nd law of thermodynamics says evolution is impossible." A long discussion ensues.
A few weeks later, another newly arrived Creationist says, "The 2nd law of thermodynamics says evolution is impossible." Another long discussion ensues.
A few weeks later, yet another newly arrived Creationist says, "The 2nd law of thermodynamics says evolution is impossible." Yet another long discussion ensues.
A few weeks later, yet another newly arrived Creationist says, "The 2nd law of thermodynamics says evolution is impossible." Yet another long discussion ensues.
This continues ad infinitum.
But no one ever need apologize to being new to the debate, and long timers should recognize that and hold their frustration in check. Each new member who raises an old point deserves just as much respect and patience as the first. Repetitiveness is the nature of the Creation/evolution debate. No matter how many time it is explained, there will always be those new to the debate. Of course, if you raise a point for which there's still an active thread then you'll probably be impatiently referred to that thread.
Each evolutionist probably has his own favorite way of responding to the Creationist position on thermodynamics. My favorites have already been taken in this thread, so I'll respond with my 3rd or 4th favorite response, which is that physicists and chemists accept the theory of evolution. Thermodynamics lies in the realm of physics and chemistry, and if evolutionists were suggesting scenarios in violation of the laws of physics and chemistry then physicists and chemists would be the first to know. That they not only have no problem with evolution but actually embrace it speaks volumes.
But the universe *is* winding down toward heat death, so what's wrong with the Creationist position on thermodynamics?
The main problem is that entropy, a key concept of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, is not a measure of unneatness or untidyness in the way that you might think of clean and dirty rooms in a house. It is a chemical measure of disorder at the atomic and molecular level. The molecules of a sweater do not care if they're in a heap on the floor or folded neatly in a drawer, the entropy of the sweater will be about the same. The entropy of molecules of the objects in a room do not care if by human standards the objects of which they're a part are all in their proper place. In fact, if we consider a dirty room with you in it as our system, then after you're done making it spic and span the entropy in the room, the amount of thermodynamic disorder, will have increased. That's because of the energy you've burned in imposing a human (not thermodynamic) sense of order on the room. By adding food (energy) to our system and giving you a meal we can again reduce the entropy of our system.
It can be difficult to think correctly about the thermodynamic behavior of a system. When considering only the transfer of heat, then one can generalize that the entropy of an object increases as you heat it. This is because the molecules of which it is made move faster and more chaotically as it get hotter. And just the opposite occurs as you cool an object. The molecular movements become slower and more ordered. A simple example is water. Molecules of steam move extremely energetically and have high entropy. As the steam condenses into water the molecules slow down, and the entropy decreases. As the water continues to cool and becomes ice the entropy decreases again as the water takes on an orderly crystaline structure.
Considering only individual objects can lead to the mistaken belief that entropy can easily decrease, and that's why it's important to think instead in terms of systems with boundaries. In a closed system neither matter nor energy crosses the system's boundaries, while in an open system both matter and energy can cross system boundaries in either direction. The laws of thermodynamics apply equally well in both open and closed systems, but it is much easier to think in terms of closed systems because you don't have to keep track of all the inputs and outputs of the system.
And so while we may accurately say that the entropy of just our bowl of water decreases as it freezes into ice, when you consider it as a system with the boundary at the bowl's outer surface then you realize that the heat of the water is radiating out of the bowl and off into space, and this process greatly increases entropy. Not only are the molecules outside our water bowl now moving more energetically and chaotically than before, but the heat formerly in our water is now more evenly distributed. Thus, while our frozen bowl of water now has decreased entropy, it has made a much greater contribution of increased entropy to the rest of the universe in the form of radiated heat. Overall entropy has increased.
Naturally the earth is not a closed system because of the huge amount of heat we receive from the sun. In the thermodynamic debate with Creationists it is common for evolutionists to consider the earth/sun system as closed, but that's a highly inaccurate picture. Less than half a billionth of the total energy of the sun is received here on earth, most of the rest radiating off into space. While the earth/sun system itself is decreasing in entropy as the pair cool and become more organized (the sun's core is a fusion reactor creating elements with thermodynamically less entropy), the sun is making an enormous contribution to the total entropy of the rest of the universe. So while entropy here on earth gradually decreases because of cooling (probably not because of life, since the amount of life probably stays roughly constant), the heat we lose is radiated off into space and contributes to the increasing entropy of the universe.
The thermodynamic processes of life are far more complex than just simple transfers of heat because extremely complex and lengthy biochemical reactions are involved. During the day the sun's energy can heat a plant to above 100oF, thereby raising its entropy, and during the evening the plant will cool to its original temperature, and one might conclude that there has been no net change in the entropy of the plant. But that's not the case, because the sun's energy has driven photosynthesis which causes some of the sun's energy to be stored in chemical bonds. That part of the sun's energy is not reradiated out into space after nightfall - it is now part of the plant, and the plant can use that energy to grow or make seeds and so forth. The plant eventually dies and decays and the energy from the sun is finally freed as it is consumed by fungi and bacteria which themselves eventually die and return their energy to the environment.
The thermodynamic argument is one of the most frustrating in the Creationist repertoir for evolutionists to face because it is so wrong and yet so effective. Even the most honest of Creationist apologists sites, Answers in Genesis, still supports the thermodynamic argument. And when simply stated it isn't even wrong, because the universe *does* tend toward disorderliness. The problem is that it's not the kind of disorderliness that we think of in everyday life, but a chemical and atomic disorderliness that has many unintuitive components.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
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JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 38 of 159 (184924)
02-13-2005 4:21 PM
Reply to: Message 37 by Percy
02-13-2005 3:10 PM


Naturally the earth is not a closed system because of the huge amount of heat we receive from the sun. In the thermodynamic debate with Creationists it is common for evolutionists to consider the earth/sun system as closed, but that's a highly inaccurate picture.
I once posted something very similar on t.o and was gently corrected; the heat radiated from the Earth is also significant. Evidence.

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Percy
Member
Posts: 22393
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 39 of 159 (184928)
02-13-2005 4:37 PM
Reply to: Message 38 by JonF
02-13-2005 4:21 PM


JonF writes:
I once posted something very similar on t.o and was gently corrected; the heat radiated from the Earth is also significant. Evidence.
Oh, yes, quite right! As I say further on in that paragraph, "So while entropy here on earth gradually decreases because of cooling..." My apologies if it wasn't clear that I was aware the cooling occurs because of heat radiated from the earth.
--Percy

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JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 40 of 159 (184929)
02-13-2005 4:38 PM
Reply to: Message 22 by JonF
02-13-2005 11:02 AM


Re: Tonnes of Energy
Oh, and I forgot this excellent and straightforward exposition of entropy and disorder: Entropy, Disorder and Life.

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Sylas
Member (Idle past 5260 days)
Posts: 766
From: Newcastle, Australia
Joined: 11-17-2002


Message 41 of 159 (184943)
02-13-2005 5:30 PM


There are so many things wrong with the thermodynamics argument that one is quite overwhelmed wondering which error to point out.
The fact of the Earth being in the middle of an enormous energy flux, flowing from the Sun and then on out into empty space, makes total entropy calculations pretty much irrelevant.
One curious side issue is that physicist/chemist Ilya Prigogine coined the term "dissipative structures" for the various complex and subtle patterns that form spontaneously in systems that are held far from thermodynamic equilibrium, and which contribute to dissipating energy that flows through the system (energy dissipation is not a bad way to describe increasing entropy). This is an example in which thermodynamics can drive the emergence of complexity.
But there is another point I want to bring up. Evolution is about change of living creatures in a lineage; parent to child. But each new organism is not made by physically transforming the parent. An organism grows by physically transforming the material it ingests.
Thermodynamics relates to the physical changes in a system; not in differences between a system and a close copy made from different materials. Growth is where thermodynamics is relevant; not in the differences from parent to child in a long sequence.
The thermodynamics argument is analogous to a conversation with the pointy haired boss of a car manufacturer who drops into the engineer's office:
Pointy haired boss: Ah, I see you are working on the new model sedan.
Engineer: Yes. This new sedan will be 10 km/hr faster than the old one.
Pointy haired boss: Isn't that a violation of conservation of momentum?
Engineer: (stunned silence)
Cheers -- Sylas
This message has been edited by Sylas, 02-13-2005 17:35 AM

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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 42 of 159 (184959)
02-13-2005 7:03 PM
Reply to: Message 41 by Sylas
02-13-2005 5:30 PM


I do not want to start a drag down and take out dispute with you Sylas, but there is no problem differentiating growth and development across clades.
A snake for instance, has a different relation of growth and development than an insectivore, as a snake will continue to grow throughout its life despite it individual development being over (you dont need to trust me but you might) while a naked mole rat can develop (mentally) beyond that; where it's epigentics stoped and thus does not grow anymore-in::the sense, that, a "law" of growth might be different than naturalselection&caused&modification&sums.
IT IS POSSIBLE THAT morphospace is populated by different laws of growth that are clade dependent but dependent on mathematical constraints of the material being subsumed by the lineage. Even within squmates I can imagine it multivertex for characters as different as distance between eyes and banding patterns. Raup's shells are the classic case of that. So on your view it would not be possible to make sense of Mendel's assertion that the statistics of his ratio (in terms of # of alleomorphs AND changes in gene frequiencies) are ACTUAL NUMBERS and not mere empirical approximations as Naglei insisted and thus inhibited from the rest of the scientific world. Mendel could only try to get approval in a more limited way than we can today. Who knows if the new poster is not the next student of Kant's grass. We can be sure there will never be a Newton of this but there can be another Darwin. Telematics does not subscript all telenomics. Of course I dont think this way but it is possible.
I understand that a physicist can "get by" with a view of the world that need not TAKE this account of numerology as would be historically related to the debate between Mendelians and Biometricians and thus is not at issue in this thread, but you would seriously be misinforming some new person to suggest that recent changes in evolutionary theory as presented by Hewitt,
quote:
"While paleontologists were properly careful about the timing of seperation of two lineages, when producint an organismal phylogeny they often saw the cladogenesis producint two new species as a simple fork. Those concerned with the process of speciation and its experimental investigation saw the fork rather differently, particularly botanists aware of divergence and hybridzation over time (Grant 1963). This often extended and complex process was also evident to those working on hybrid zones, where it was apparent that genomes had developed different degrees of divergence and reproductive isolation (Hewitt 1989). Once again the advent of DNA techniques meant that an organism's phylogeny could be based on sequence geneologies, as was recognized by a number of people(e.g. Barton 1988; Pamilo & Nei 1988; Avise 1989; Hey 1994). The simple phlogenetic fork comprises the seperation over time of complexly entwined lineages of one population into two seperate bundles, rather like plaiting one clump of honeysuckle up both sides of a window. Whilst this realization embraces the disparate concepts of systematic phylogeny and population genetics, it is taking some time for entrained thought patterns to be overgrown." (Molecular Ecology (2001) TEN,537-549 "Speciation, hybrid zones and phylogeography - or seeing genes in space and time"
,can simply be subscribed as you did in a few sentences.
You said,
But there is another point I want to bring up. Evolution is about change of living creatures in a lineage; parent to child. But each new organism is not made by physically transforming the parent. An organism grows by physically transforming the material it ingests.
Thermodynamics relates to the physical changes in a system; not in differences between a system and a close copy made from different materials. Growth is where thermodynamics is relevant; not in the differences from parent to child in a long sequence.
Have you at least tried to read any of Georgi Gladyshev's work I have posted here at EvC? If "the material" is clade specific in the sense I indicated above IT IS possible to think of biological change in the sense of a "" close copy diTTo. Not only is that not a new thought I bet there are many here who can go into some detail on the
the difference of Wright vs Kimura METRICS compared with Fisher/Haldane geometry. If not I could. the dipute is really only over how many prongs are on the fork and that is why Mark was correct to identify a vector of BOTH entropy and complexity IN THE DEBATE.
This message has been edited by Brad McFall, 02-13-2005 19:35 AM

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Sylas
Member (Idle past 5260 days)
Posts: 766
From: Newcastle, Australia
Joined: 11-17-2002


Message 43 of 159 (184963)
02-13-2005 7:33 PM
Reply to: Message 42 by Brad McFall
02-13-2005 7:03 PM


Brad McFall writes:
I do not want to start a drag down and take out dispute with you Sylas
No worries, Brad; that won't happen. For whatever reason, I simply cannot follow your posts sufficiently well to attempt an engagement.
I think, but am not sure, that you operate at a much more sophisticated level. My comments here were addressed at a more simple minded failure to understand thermodynamics.
There are indeed some interesting questions relating to thermodynamics and the living world. However, there is simply no basis for saying that thermodynamics conflicts with evolutionary change, including those changes which are an increase in complexity.
How much insight can be gained into evolutionary change by application of ideas from thermodynamics is an interesting question. To get any sensible insight, one needs to get over some very straightforward hurdles first. You don't get useful insights from people who simply think in terms of "evolution means increasing complexity; and that is a conflict with the second law". That's wrong.
Cheers -- Sylas

This message is a reply to:
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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 44 of 159 (184966)
02-13-2005 7:39 PM
Reply to: Message 43 by Sylas
02-13-2005 7:33 PM


ok

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Jordo86
Inactive Member


Message 45 of 159 (184981)
02-13-2005 8:17 PM
Reply to: Message 37 by Percy
02-13-2005 3:10 PM


Thanks Percy!
But yeah, i never said i was a creationist, just someone sceptical of TTOE and curious what evolutionists views are. We can all agree that in the end the entire universe will be just heat energy. But i want to know how the universe got that start, how dust and elements built up into trees, how "simple" (and i use the term loosly because even the most simple organisms are more complex than anything man has made) grew out of the water.
CRASHFROG "Well, wait, now. Complexity and order are not the same thing. The second law says nothing about complexity. In fact, complexity and order are almost the opposite thing. Ordered systems are very, very simple. Complex systems are very disordered."
Why do complex systems have to be disordered? Look at humans, we are incredibly complex beings but with order to match. Two eyes, two arms, two legs ect ect. We are very eficient machines! And the complexity of our eyes alone (i bet you get this one a lot ) i beleive defy evolution.
But back to this point. While your right on them not being the same thing, they seem to go together (for whatever reason) in this world anyway

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