CO_Hoya
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
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Post by CO_Hoya on May 4, 2006 17:48:05 GMT -5
You are getting several things mixed up. Initially you essentially describe physical vs. chemical reactions. I am not sure what your point is here, The physical (expansion of a gas) is an example of one use of the 2nd law of TD, the chemical is an example of another. It was meant to show that seemingly contradictory results (increase of entropy vs. decrease of entropy) are both satisfactory results under the 2nd law. I applied the 2nd law to both Well, it is the 1st law of TD, so it also needs to be met. The point (which I didn't state clearly) is that the 2nd law says spontaneous reactions increase entropy of the system, but entropy of the system does not need to increase for a reaction to take place. The sun really had nothing to do with the 2 examples I cited. Not sure what you were referring to. Umm, my model (2H2 + O2 -> 2H2O) proceeds towards less chaos, if left alone. For a more biologically relevent experiment, the formation of micelle films is the first example that springs to mind. Also, I'm not sure how "a degree of guidance" is better than "transfer of entropy from the system to the surroundings." Again, I don't see what law was violated. The 2nd law of TD is perfectly content to have a system (e.g. amino acids in a drop of water) decrease in entropy, so long as the surroundings increase by the same amount or more.
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Post by Coast2CoastHoya on May 5, 2006 13:24:20 GMT -5
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hifigator
Platinum Hoya (over 5000 posts)
Posts: 6,387
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Post by hifigator on May 5, 2006 13:55:14 GMT -5
I was responding to questions raised by you as well as another. Sorry for the confusion. Here is one simple link that covers the topic in everyday language. www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae280.cfmHere are a couple of excerpts: These findings frustrated the believers of a perpetual motion machine, and angered the industrial tycoons who sponsored the whole endeavor. Yet, not all was completely lost. Carnot's equation helped industrial engineers design engines that could operate up to an 80% efficiency level - an enormous improvement over prior designs, increasing productivity exponentially. Moreover, by reversing the heat-to-work process, the invention of the refrigerator was made possible! Yet, the greatest overall fruit of this venture was the development of the Second Thermodynamic Law, which would later achieve a legendary status as a fundamental law of natural science.
Let us shortly return to Carnot and the heat engine. The irrevocable loss of some energy to the environment was associated with an increase of disorder in that system. Scientists wishing to further penetrate the realm of chaos needed a variable that could be used to calculate disorder. Thanks to mid-nineteenth century physicist, R.J.E. Clausius, this Pandemonium could be measured in terms of a quantity named entropy (the variable S). Entropy acts as a function of the state of a system - where a high amount of entropy translates to higher chaos within the system, and low entropy signals a highly ordered state.
Like Carnot, Clausius worked out a general equation, his being devoted to the measurement of entropy change over a period of time: (change)S = Q / T (the change in entropy is equal to the amount of heat added to the system [by an invertible process] divided by the temperature in degrees Kelvin). The beauty of this equation is that it can be used to compute the entropic change of any exchange in nature, not solely limited to machines. This development brought thermodynamics out of the industrial workplace, and opened the possibility for further studies into the tendencies of natural order (and lack therefore of), eventually extending to the universe as a whole.
Applying this knowledge to nature, physicists found that the total entropy change (change in S) always increases for every naturally occurring event (within a closed system) that could be then observed. Thus, they theorized, disorder must be continually augmenting evenly throughout the universe. When you put ice into a hot cup of tea (aristocrats of the Victorian era were constantly thinking of tea), heat will flow from the hot tea to the cold ice and melt the ice in the beloved beverage. Then, once the energy in the cup is evenly distributed, the cooled tea would reach a maximum state of entropy. This situation represents a standard increase in disorder, believed to be perpetually occurring throughout the entire universe.The emphasis given was my own. The point is that this is definitely a complex issue without a clear rectifying answer. There can clearly be a coflict of some degree.
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VelvetElvis
Silver Hoya (over 500 posts)
pka MrPathetic
Posts: 934
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Post by VelvetElvis on May 5, 2006 14:07:19 GMT -5
"The point is that this is definitely a complex issue without a clear rectifying answer. There can clearly be a coflict of some degree." This could be used to explain many of the oddities in our little existance. One of which: Why does Hifi continue to post on the HOYAtalk message board?
Or....
Why does VE continue to acknowledge HiFi?
ponder that, effers!
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CO_Hoya
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,109
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Post by CO_Hoya on May 5, 2006 14:18:32 GMT -5
Okay, your article just reinforced what I was trying to say.
(I added my emphasis.)
A naturally occurring event (which, by the way, is a lousy term that could mean a lot of things, but I'll play along) increases entropy in the surroundings. The universe represents the closed system, while any subset is functionally an open system ineracting with its surroundings.
Returning to an already stated example, micelles in a drop of water would be a system. There is no problem with them forming a film layer as a naturally occurring event, which would reduce the entropy in that drop of water, so long as the surroudings' entropy increased commensurately, presumably by a miniscule amount of heat increase in the air surrounding the hypothetical drop.
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hifigator
Platinum Hoya (over 5000 posts)
Posts: 6,387
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Post by hifigator on May 5, 2006 15:23:50 GMT -5
Okay, your article just reinforced what I was trying to say. (I added my emphasis.) A naturally occurring event (which, by the way, is a lousy term that could mean a lot of things, but I'll play along) increases entropy in the surroundings. The universe represents the closed system, while any subset is functionally an open system ineracting with its surroundings. Returning to an already stated example, micelles in a drop of water would be a system. There is no problem with them forming a film layer as a naturally occurring event, which would reduce the entropy in that drop of water, so long as the surroudings' entropy increased commensurately, presumably by a miniscule amount of heat increase in the air surrounding the hypothetical drop. Now do you see why I was talking about the sun as our source of energy before? That is really the "answer" to the question from your perspective. That is that the sun is continuing to pour energy into our "system." So that is why the second law need not apply. That is still a debatable topic for sure, but not one to be simply dismissed as being no issue at all.
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CO_Hoya
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,109
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Post by CO_Hoya on May 5, 2006 15:41:41 GMT -5
Now do you see why I was talking about the sun as our source of energy before? That is really the "answer" to the question from your perspective. That is that the sun is continuing to pour energy into our "system." This is a bit tangential to what I was just talking about, but I don't disagree. Gaak!! What? The point of the sun is really to satisfy the first law. If "naturally occurring events" are transferring energy to their surroundings via entropy, the sun provides a source of enthalpy from the surroundings to the system to keep accounts in order. The 2nd law most certainly still does apply (entropy for the system and its surroundings does not decrease). I have NEVER said that we get a holiday from the 2nd law. I was pointing out that if you don't acknowledge the surroundings, along with the system, it just appears that way. Lousy accounting is all that is. With all due respect, you seem to be trying to turn an immutable natural law into debate by faulty logic. Maybe I just missed a step somewhere, but where does the 2nd law of TD stop applying?
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hifigator
Platinum Hoya (over 5000 posts)
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Post by hifigator on May 5, 2006 16:32:49 GMT -5
Whe you highlited "in a closed system" I thought you were making the point that we are in and of ourself a closed system, that we are an open system and that the sun was an external source of energy. If so, then the 2nd law need not apply, not because it would be "wrong" but rather that we would now be dealing with a system which was receiving the influx of energy. If you are including the sun "in" our system then we are then back to square one where the net result of our transferring of energies is supposed to result in greater entropy. Now if we are evolving towards order, where is the offsetting growth in disorder. A random explosion of another planet somewhere is a release of potential energy and therefore a step in the direction of chaos, but where is the correlation? Where is the generated entropy created by our greater order? Using your glass of water analogy, where is the extra chaos from our "orderification?"
Here are a couple of quotes from Jonathan A. Drake's book dealing on the subject:
There are no transitional forms found, only the end product. David Kitz said, "Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them."[2] David Kitts is an evolutionist. Even if one or two were found, they are suspect even among evolutionists and in order to prove evolution, you would need hundreds of thousands everywhere.
Unfortunately for those convinced of evolution, the theory contradicts ... laws of science. The second Law of Thermodynamics is clearly violated as evolution says that everything began as simple forms and gradually evolved into more complex ones. But as that law states, everything tends to disorder.
Some arguments for evolution is that if you give it enough time anything could happen. But unbeknownst to most, evolution doesn't have enough time. Billions or trillions of years is not even close to how much time would be needed. Rick Ramashing and Sir Fred Hoyle calculated the probability for one cell to evolve by chance. The atheist/agnostic team found to their disbelief that it is 1 chance in 10 to the 40,000th power years just for one cell to evolve. Hoyle said, "The chance that higher life forms might have emerged in this way is comparable with the chance that 'a tornado sweeping through a junk-yard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.' "[3] Does evolution have enough time? No.
Remember, my initial and current point is still the same. I am not here to disprove evolution and I am not here to even say anything about creationism. It has plenty of its own problems as well. My point is that from the facts that we have, we cannot and should not present evolution as fact. Yes it is still called "theory" but more and more it is being presented as fact. Macro-evolution is nothing more than some people's ideas of what might have happened.
Notice we haven't even gotten into the major holes in the fossil record. Or the rapid explosion in parts of it ... or errors in the geological column ... or ...
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CO_Hoya
Golden Hoya (over 1000 posts)
Posts: 1,109
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Post by CO_Hoya on May 5, 2006 18:01:33 GMT -5
Frankly, I really have no interest in arguing evolution v. creationism. Rather, I just wanted to retrieve the 2nd law of TD from the wastebasket.
Regarding systems, there are no truly closed systems, excluding the universe as a whole. You can arbitrarily define what you'd like as a system (evolving organisms, the Earth, a packet of gum, whatever). But whatever you chose, you have to recognize that the system interacts with its surroundings. So that system can happily decrease in entropy, so long as entropy doesn't decrease in the universe.
The drop (or glass) of water, in which a micelle film is formed from individual micelles, would release some amount of heat to its surroundings (as I mentioned above). This heat represents an entropy transfer - the gas molecules in the air are now moving around a bit quicker and more chaotically than before. Conversely, if you were to warm up the water (transfer heat from the surroundings back into our system), you can break up the micelle film -> more chaos (entropy) in the water. But, the cost is now our surroundings are a bit cooler, and therefore more ordered.
If you are really interested in understanding this stuff, you should consider taking a course in thermodynamics, or at least hunt down a refrigerator repairman.
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hifigator
Platinum Hoya (over 5000 posts)
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Post by hifigator on May 6, 2006 10:47:18 GMT -5
Frankly, I really have no interest in arguing evolution v. creationism. Rather, I just wanted to retrieve the 2nd law of TD from the wastebasket. Regarding systems, there are no truly closed systems, excluding the universe as a whole. You can arbitrarily define what you'd like as a system (evolving organisms, the Earth, a packet of gum, whatever). But whatever you chose, you have to recognize that the system interacts with its surroundings. So that system can happily decrease in entropy, so long as entropy doesn't decrease in the universe. The drop (or glass) of water, in which a micelle film is formed from individual micelles, would release some amount of heat to its surroundings (as I mentioned above). This heat represents an entropy transfer - the gas molecules in the air are now moving around a bit quicker and more chaotically than before. Conversely, if you were to warm up the water (transfer heat from the surroundings back into our system), you can break up the micelle film -> more chaos (entropy) in the water. But, the cost is now our surroundings are a bit cooler, and therefore more ordered. If you are really interested in understanding this stuff, you should consider taking a course in thermodynamics, or at least hunt down a refrigerator repairman. First things first ... that last line is rather amusing. Fair enough on the issue. I too am not interested in debating creationism. I am just pointing out that many are under the assumption that macro-evolution is proven science. The facts are that it is not. Micro-evolution is a fact. Those who believe in macro-evolution are exhibiting a degree of faith -- not that I have a problem with that, but only with those who deny that much. One last note pertaining to potential conflicts with the 2nd law. Would you argue that an implication of the 2nd law is that there is a systemic trend towards disorder/entropy over time and that secondly from everything we can measure/calculate/formulate/test etc... we find this to be true? If so, then common sense would certainly suggest a conflict with the theory of macro-evolution, whose sole mechanism is essentially an extremely gradual repeated systemic process towards order.
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