wdog

hi folks,

I would like to collect papers that have been published on evolution and thermodynamics. I did a search among the physics journals and pulled up about zilch. Could some of you bio types put aside your dissection kits for a second(jk)and help me get going? specific journals, maybe some specific papers, like prigogine's work, books, ect. would be helpful. Also has there been any serious work done from the ID/creationist side of the house? I know that they probably can't get published, but I would like to know just what their best work has been to justify what they claim. thanks

and no links to naked Dr. Laura please, I have a weak stomach

liquid

Physics journals may well not have much in them. Pure physicists these days are not overwhelmingly concerned with thermodyanmics, and certainly not with biology.

Better to investigate us engineer's journals on biomemetics, for papers on the thermodynamics of organisms. This won't be so useful in terms of evolution however, so you should go to biophysics journals for studies of populations. Biochemists are also into this. It is also worth checking out dissipative structures, where organised systems form on an entropy-diffusing gradient, in order to more efficiently raise global entropy, much like a river always taking the fastest route down.

The problem is that this whole second law rubbish really is not an issue among the scientific community, at least not in the sense the creationists make use of.

Yup, on reflection, biochemistry is the way to go.

Tim Thompson

I suggest you start with the <a href="http://www-lecb.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/" target="_blank">webpage of Tom Schneider</a>, who leads the Molecular Information Theory Group, Laboratory of Computational and Experimental Biology, National Institutes of Health. He has done much of the recent work on entropy & evolution, relating to the 2nd law of thermodynamics. There is a lot of stuff there, but perhaps most interesting along these lines is his paper "<a href="http://www.lecb.ncifcrf.gov/~toms/paper/ev/" target="_blank">Evolution of Biological Informatiopn</a>"; the webpage includes several responses to criticisms from William Dembski, one of the Godfathers of Intelligent Design theory. Also see <a href="http://www.fred.net/tds/anti/anticreationist.html" target="_blank">Schneider's AntiCreationist page</a> (moved to a non-government owned computer).

Automaton

Although there is absolutely no conflict between thermodynamics and biology, if you're really interested, try the field of biophysics. There are quite a few journals out there, notably: <a href="http://www.academicpress.com/www/journal/rc.htm" target="_blank">Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications</a>, which has some free articles online.

wdog

thanks for the info,

I realize that there really is no apparent conflict between evolution and the second law, and therefore why would anyone want waste time demonstrating what is not a scientifically interesing problem. I myself would not be interested but for the fact science is under attack by creationism and we have a public relations problem. With that motivation I was thinking that someone had set about to formally demonstrate the lack of conflict.
thanks again

young_bible_boy9

You may want to check into the work of Russian physicist Ilya Prigogine as well on this.
In 1977 Prigogine won the Nobel prize for demonstrating that local areas of physical (molecular) assemblage and spontaneous order CAN arise from thermal chaos in the form of "dissipative structures". Theoretically a dissipative structure(s) lasting hundreds of thousands or even millions of years is possible, if one views the grand scale. Draw your own cosmic conclusions from that one, folks. Prigogine essentially came up with a rethink on the 2nd law of thermodynamics as a set-in-stone absolute constant.

<a href="http://order.ph.utexas.edu/" target="_blank">The Prigogine Institute</a>

<a href="http://www.simonsays.com/book/default_book.cfm?isbn=0684837056" target="_blank">"Works"</a>

wdog

thanks again bible boy