Date: Sat, 27 Apr 1996 09:29:49 -0500
From: rahul-AT-peaches.ph.utexas.edu (Rahul Mahajan)
Subject: Re: Group or individual -Reply


Adam:
>Your argument is equivalent to a chemist arguing that a chemical explanation
>of the rise of cellular life is "impossibly contradictory". On the one hand,
>the chemist can argue whatever they like, but the fact is, chemistry did
>give rise to evolution. On the other hand, they are in a sense correct -
>evolution does seem to contradict chemistry ( eg the law of entropy seems to
>be directly contradicted ). The reality has contradictions. So what's new ?
>
>Adam.
>
>PS Sociologically, perhaps you are insisting on a Darwinian approach as
>a reaction to the religious creationists in the US ?

Didn't see this until today. I just have to comment. Neither evolution nor
life is a contradiction of the second law of thermodynamics (law of
entropy). The law states that the total entropy of a *closed system* does
not decrease with time. The entire earth is anything but a closed system.
Certainly life is not. The entropy increase in the sun, for example, while
evolution has been going on, vastly dwarfs any putative decrease in entropy
in certain insignificant sectors on earth. In fact, so does the total
entropy increase on the earth. This argument is bandied around by the
creationists over here, but it's a bad idea to try to learn science from
them.

Rahul




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