The Cross vs. the Swastika

The Second Law wasn't devised or discovered in the Apollo mission to the moon or through the land rover on mars. The Second Law was observed on and applies to THIS planet. If you're claiming this planet is decreasing in entropy, you are utter fool.

This planet is headed for maximun entropy. A hurricane does not result in an decrease in entropy on the planet or more order. Any decrease is at the expense of an increase in entropy in the surroundings of the hurricane. And that, in no one, takes away from the FACT, the earth is increasing in entropy. The net result of a hurricane -- anyone can see it -- is more disorder, BTW.

“...there are no known violations of the second law of thermodynamics. Ordinarily the second law is stated for isolated [closed] systems, but the second law applies equally well to open systems ... there is somehow associated with the field of far-from equilibrium phenomena the notion that the second law of thermodynamics fails for such systems. It is important to make sure that this error does not perpetuate itself.” [Dr. John Ross, Harvard scientist (evolutionist), Chemical and Engineering News, vol. 58, July 7, 1980, p. 40]

Creationist and author of the Second Law, Lord Kelvin is laughing is ass off in heaven at you and the pseudo-sceintists that are butchering his law.

Creationist and author of the Second Law, Lord Kelvin:

The Absolute Temperature Scale still bears Lord Kelvin's name, but other exploits in his day, like the submarine cable, revolutionary ship's compass and 69 other patented brainwaves, made him a household word. He died in 1907 with over 600 published scientific papers to his credit, 70 patented inventions and 21 honorary degrees. Elected unanimously at 22 as Glasgow University's youngest professor ever, he opened every lecture with prayer. "A firm believer in creation for his entire life he often insisted that the power to analyze, to look for causes, was itself a creation of God. He never ceased to look for causes, causes of causes, and for causes of these in return. Seeking a cause for the escape of heat from the Earth, he became in the end a founder of geophysics and the joint discoverer of the Second Law of Thermodynamics." He was 35 in 1859, when Darwin published his "Origin of the Species."

Could he have dreamed then that the Law he helped co-discover would today be one of the biggest headaches to Darwin's theory? "The sheer venturesomeness of Kelvin's speculations were possible only because of his underlying certainty that behind everything lay the power of the Creator God. Science, in his view, could never lead a man to disbelieve in God." Kelvin wouldn't buy today's notion that creation is somehow "unscientific." When his sister in later years read to him Darwin's early statement of "disbelief in Divine revelation and evidence of creative design in the Universe," Kelvin, "unhesitatingly denounced it as utterly unscientific."

Darwin apparently published his theory with much apprehension, fearing the scorn of fellow scientists; in the first edition of his "Origin," he prepared a line retreat along Lamark's ideas in case his theory of natural selection was found indefensible (Life & Letters of Charles Darwin - Ed. Francis Darwin, D. Appleton & Company, 1888, vol. 2, pp. 12-15). Professor C. D. Darlington was of the opinion that Darwinism began "as a theory that could be explained by natural selection; it ended as a theory that evolution could be explained just as you would like it to be explained" (Darlington: "The Origin of Darwinism," Scientific American, 200, 5:60; May 1959, pp. 60-61).

The evolutionist rationale is simply that life on earth is an “exception” because we live in an open system: “The sun provides more than enough energy to drive things.” This supply of available energy, we are assured, adequately satisfies any objection to evolution on the basis of the second law.

But simply adding energy to a system doesn’t automatically cause reduced entropy (i.e., increased organized complexity, or “build-up” rather than “break-down”). Raw solar energy alone does not decrease entropy—in fact, it increases entropy, speeding up the natural processes that cause break-down, disorder, and disorganization on earth (consider, for example, your car’s paint job, a wooden fence, or a decomposing animal carcass, both with and then without the addition of solar radiation).

Yes, sooooo strange, that the list just happens to include the Founders of the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics, including Lord Kelvin, who was 35 when Darwin wrote his theory:

Lord Kelvin's Second Law

The Absolute Temperature Scale still bears Lord Kelvin's name, but other exploits in his day, like the submarine cable, revolutionary ship's compass and 69 other patented brainwaves, made him a household word. He died in 1907 with over 600 published scientific papers to his credit, 70 patented inventions and 21 honorary degrees. Elected unanimously at 22 as Glasgow University's youngest professor ever, he opened every lecture with prayer. "A firm believer in creation for his entire life he often insisted that the power to analyze, to look for causes, was itself a creation of God. He never ceased to look for causes, causes of causes, and for causes of these in return. Seeking a cause for the escape of heat from the Earth, he became in the end a founder of geophysics and the joint discoverer of the Second Law of Thermodynamics." He was 35 in 1859, when Darwin published his "Origin of the Species."

Could he have dreamed then that the Law he helped co-discover would today be one of the biggest headaches to Darwin's theory? "The sheer venturesomeness of Kelvin's speculations were possible only because of his underlying certainty that behind everything lay the power of the Creator God. Science, in his view, could never lead a man to disbelieve in God." Kelvin wouldn't buy today's notion that creation is somehow "unscientific." When his sister in later years read to him Darwin's early statement of "disbelief in Divine revelation and evidence of creative design in the Universe," Kelvin, "unhesitatingly denounced it as utterly unscientific."

Darwin apparently published his theory with much apprehension, fearing the scorn of fellow scientists; in the first edition of his "Origin," he prepared a line retreat along Lamark's ideas in case his theory of natural selection was found indefensible (Life & Letters of Charles Darwin - Ed. Francis Darwin, D. Appleton & Company, 1888, vol. 2, pp. 12-15). Professor C. D. Darlington was of the opinion that Darwinism began "as a theory that could be explained by natural selection; it ended as a theory that evolution could be explained just as you would like it to be explained" (Darlington: "The Origin of Darwinism," Scientific American, 200, 5:60; May 1959, pp. 60-61).

How about Stephen J. Gould, who unlike the Darwinistic cultist here, admits Darwin's theory has real problems:

Tom Bethell held the most recent wake in a piece called "Darwin's Mistake" (Harper's, February 1976): "Darwin's theory, I believe, is on the verge of collapse.…Natural selection was quietly abandoned, even by his most ardent supporters, some years ago." News to me, and I, although I wear the Darwinian label with some pride, am not among the most ardent defenders of natural selection. I recall Mark Twain's famous response to a premature obituary: "The reports of death are greatly exaggerated."

Bethell's argument has a curious ring for most practicing scientists. We are always ready to watch a theory fall under the impact of new data, but we do not expect a great and influential theory to collapse from a logical error in its formulation. Virtually every empirical scientist has a touch of the Philistine. Scientists tend to ignore academic philosophy as an empty pursuit. Surely, any intelligent person can think straight by intuition. Yet Bethell cites no data at all in sealing the coffin of natural selection, only an error in Darwin's reasoning: "Darwin made a mistake sufficiently serious to undermine his theory. And that mistake has only recently been recognized as such.…At one point in his argument, Darwin was mislead."

Although I will try to refute Bethell, I also deplore the unwillingness of scientists to explore seriously the logical structure of arguments. Much of what passes for evolutionary theory is as vacuous as Bethell claims. Many great theories are held together by chains of dubious metaphor and analogy

The Second Law was almost exclusively devised based on observations ON THIS planet. The Second Law primarily applies to living things on this planet that use energy. The earth is headed for maximum entropy and entropy is increasing on the planet.

Evolutionists want to come up with unproven, illogical theories to refute this fact. No, the sun does not decrease entropy. Raw solar energy increases entropy.

But, there are NO known violations of the Second Law:

“...there are no known violations of the second law of thermodynamics. Ordinarily the second law is stated for isolated [closed] systems, but the second law applies equally well to open systems ... there is somehow associated with the field of far-from equilibrium phenomena the notion that the second law of thermodynamics fails for such systems. It is important to make sure that this error does not perpetuate itself.” [Dr. John Ross, Harvard scientist (evolutionist), Chemical and Engineering News, vol. 58, July 7, 1980, p. 40]

Stephen J. Gould, who unlike the Darwinistic cultist here, admits Darwin's theory has real problems:

Tom Bethell held the most recent wake in a piece called "Darwin's Mistake" (Harper's, February 1976): "Darwin's theory, I believe, is on the verge of collapse.…Natural selection was quietly abandoned, even by his most ardent supporters, some years ago." News to me, and I, although I wear the Darwinian label with some pride, am not among the most ardent defenders of natural selection. I recall Mark Twain's famous response to a premature obituary: "The reports of death are greatly exaggerated."

Bethell's argument has a curious ring for most practicing scientists. We are always ready to watch a theory fall under the impact of new data, but we do not expect a great and influential theory to collapse from a logical error in its formulation. Virtually every empirical scientist has a touch of the Philistine. Scientists tend to ignore academic philosophy as an empty pursuit. Surely, any intelligent person can think straight by intuition. Yet Bethell cites no data at all in sealing the coffin of natural selection, only an error in Darwin's reasoning: "Darwin made a mistake sufficiently serious to undermine his theory. And that mistake has only recently been recognized as such.…At one point in his argument, Darwin was mislead."

Although I will try to refute Bethell, I also deplore the unwillingness of scientists to explore seriously the logical structure of arguments. Much of what passes for evolutionary theory is as vacuous as Bethell claims. Many great theories are held together by chains of dubious metaphor and analogy

Now here is the perplexity for the evolutionists: The Cambrian is the last stratum of the descending levels that has any fossils in it. All the lower strata below the Cambrian have absolutely no fossil record of life other than some single-celled types such as bacteria and algae.

Absolutely, totally false and refuted already. For the second time:

Vendian Animals.

Phylum-Level Evolution by recovering YEC Glenn R. Morton.

You're brazenly repeating the already-refuted. Are you out of ammo?

. . . your car’s paint job, a wooden fence, or a decomposing animal carcass, both with and then without the addition of solar radiation.

Anyone who has read this whole thread (someone with a lot of time and nothing important to do) would get the feeling that you've posted exactly these words before, complete with bogus examples. Why pretend this hasn't been shot down already?

How many times have you posted this Ross quote? In this case, you post it as a reply to my 457 in which I analyze and expose your dishonest tap dance. A reply it is, but not an answer.

No, YOU'VE been refuted by the fossil record. There are 250 million fossils and virtually no missing links. There aren't even enough fossils to complete evolutionary trees. The Cambrian is the last stratum of the descending levels that has any fossils in it. All the lower strata below the Cambrian have absolutely no fossil record of life other than some single-celled types such as bacteria and algae. Why not? The Cambrian layer is full of all the major kinds of animals found today except the vertebrates. In other words, there is nothing primitive about the structure of these most ancient fossils known to man.

"The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nods of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. Yet Darwin was so wedded to gradualism that he wagered his entire theory on a denial of this literal record." (Gould, Stephen J. "The Panda’s Thumb, 1980, p. 181)

"Fossil discoveries can muddle over attempts to construct simple evolutionary trees--fossils from key periods are often not intermediates, but rather hode podges of defining features of many different groups... Generally, it seems that major groups are not assembled in a simple linear or progressive manner--new features are often "cut and pasted" on different groups at different times." (Shubin, Neil, "Evolutionary Cut and Paste," Nature, vol. 349, 1998, p. 39.)

"The fossil record of evolutionary change within single evolutionary lineages is very poor. If evolution is true, species originate through changes of ancestral species: one might expect to be able to see this in the fossil record. In fact it can rarely be seen. In 1859 Darwin could not cite a single example." (Ridley, Mark, The Problems of Evolution, 1985, p. 11)

Well, we are now about 120 years after Darwin and the knowledge of the fossil record has been greatly expanded. We now have a quarter of a million fossil species but the situation hasn’t changed much. The record of evolution is still surprisingly jerky and, ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transition than we had in Darwin’s time. By this I mean that some of the classic cases of Darwinian change in the fossil record, such as the evolution of the horse in North America, have had to be discarded or modified as a result of more detailed information..." (Raup, David M., "Conflicts Between Darwin and Paleontology," Field Museum of Natural History Bulletin, vol. 50, 1979, p. 25.)

Yet, you blindly continue to believe fairy tales with no evidence....

Until in sinks in your thick skull. You DO deny the Second Law applies to the planet. You claim the earth is decreasing in entropy and that life forms are not becoming more disorderly. That is a denial of the Second Law in regard to the planet.

The hurricane example is silly. The sun does not decrease entropy, it increases entropy.

Being a generalization of experience, the second law could only be invalidated by an actual engine. In other words, the question,. "Can the second law of thermodynamics be circumvented?" is not well-worded and could be answered only if the model incorporated every feature of the real world. But an answer can readily be given to the question, "Has the second law of thermodynamics been circumvented?" Not yet. Frank A. Grew, "On the Second Law of Thermodynamics," American Laboratory (October 1982), p.88.

Henry Morris:

Of course, the fact that no exception to the law of increasing entropy has ever been observed does not prove such a thing never happened. It simply shows that such ideas are outside the scope of science. Evolutionists are free to believe in such "singularities" by faith, if they wish (e.g., the inflationary universe, hopeful monsters, etc.) but they have no right impose them on unsuspecting young minds in the name of science.

In the first place, the entropy principle applies at least as much to open systems as to closed systems. In an isolated real system, shut off from external energy, the entropy (or disorganization) will always increase. In an open system (such as the earth receiving an influx of heat energy from the sun), the entropy always tends to increase, and, as a matter of fact, will usually increase more rapidly than if the system remained closed!

That is utterly absurd. For living things to be exempt from the Second Law, you've have to rewrite the Second Law.

Like Don Quixote, you tilt at windmills, thinking they be giants.

Where, pray tell, did you fabricate the idea that I said living things are exempt form the 2LoT? Why are you misrepresenting what I wrote? Are you really unable to comprehend the words that I used, or do you not read them because it might lead to a "forbidden" thought entering your mind?

The Second Law's MAIN application is toward living things that use energy.

Then main application of the "Second Law of Thermodynamics" is ...... Thermodynamics!. It is not restricted to biology; it covers biology and MANY non-living systems, including, but not limited to, inert gases, inorganic chemical reactions, and processes in stellar interiors, to name but a few. BTW, are you suggesting that there are "living things" that DON'T use energy, or was that just another one of your grammatical errors?

The idea that living things are becoming more orderly and the rest of the earth more disorderly is absolutely brainless. [emphasis added to highlight your juvenile argumentation tactics]

But you already admitted in an earlier reply that localized entropy decreases were possible at the expense of the entropy increasing even more in the rest of the system and its surroundings. The living things concentrate energy (from the food they eat), build muscle, reproduce (if they're lucky), and die, and which point the energy concentrated in their bodies is diffused to the surroundings, increasing the entropy of the system and its environment, exactly as the 2LoT demands. Even while they are alive, the entropy decrease in the organism is bought and paid for at the expense of an even greater amount of entropy INCREASE in the organism's surroundings, as the organism diffuses waste heat throughout its environment. IF you think there is a violation of the 2LoT, please point out which step it occurred in.

You ought to ask you university for REFUND of your thermodynamics class.

Sparky, you sound JUST LIKE that guy earning a minimum wage who is STILL busing tables in the cafeteria at my Alma Mater. But then I can understand why he would make a statement like that -- he lacked the intellectual ability to make a coherent argument about just about anything. What's your excuse, Sparky? Oh, by the way, table seven needs to be cleared....

With long-winded propaganda, theory or cutting pasting, give me a reason why you believe entropy is decreasing on this planet (in contradiction to the Second Law).

The hurricane example is lame and absurd. That does not result in a decrease in entropy on the planet or in the universe. Nor does the result of a hurricane lead to more order, rather disorder.

You admit Ross is an evolutionist. So is Gould. So is Asimov. All of them would consider you a witch-doctor trying to garb himself in a lab coat.

The sun's energy performs all sorts of actions upon the earth's surface. Many of them result in work. Many of them can be used to locally reverse entropy.

Let's go back to that water wheel I mentioned somewhere back there. A creationist might say that it does work useful to humans because it had a human designer. (Well, duh-uh!) But lots of work gets done by hurricanes, tornadoes, rain and wind without human agency. It may only randomly be useful to humans, but so what?

Let's suppose you wanted to build a water wheel where there was no natural stream. You want to divert some of your mill's output to pumping water back upstream to feed your mill continuously from an artificial reservoir which you will fill manually the first time, hauling the water by truck.

This scheme will not work. The first law of thermo (conservation of energy) says you can't win. The second law says you can't even break even; you're certain to come out behind with every cycle and rapidly grind to a halt. For all that this scheme has a Designer and lots of organizing input etc. etc. it can't work.

But when you site your mill on a natural stream, you have the sun raising your water back to the top of the mountains for you. Yes, your God would seem to be a Sun God here. Note that this version works because the earth is not a closed system.

It isn't having a Designer or an organizing principle or whatever that makes a difference, and no non-creationist version of the second law mentions any such thing ever. It's having an energy source to pay the entropy bill. The second law says you have to have that and we do. No miracles needed.

Anyone who has read this whole thread (someone with a lot of time and nothing important to do) ...

Hey! Are you saying I don't have a life?

The hurricane example is absurd. It proves absolutely nothing. The question is does the Second Law apply to the earth. The Second Law clearly supports an increase in entropy and the concept of physical systems becoming more disorderly. A hurricane does NOT involve the earth decreasing entropy and the net result is more disorder. It's a stupid example.

What fact, not theory, do you have that life on this planet is exempt from the Second Law in regard to disorder? And what fact do you have that planet is decreasing in entropy (if you believe that as Vlade seems to)?

With long-winded propaganda, theory or cutting pasting, give me a reason why you believe entropy is decreasing on this planet (in contradiction to the Second Law).

I assume the planet is pretty much in equilibrium. We get energy in by day (half the planet at any given moment). We radiate it out by night (the other half). The thermodynamic entropy is pretty much the same but the sun runs down, losing potential all the time.

The hurricane example is lame and absurd. That does not result in a decrease in entropy on the planet or in the universe. Nor does the result of a hurricane lead to more order, rather disorder.

Still pretending you can't see what is in front of you. The hurricane is a local decrease. An organism is a local decrease. The earth is a local stasis. All allowed because the sun burns itself up and we live in the outflow like that paddle-wheeled mill on the stream between the mountain rainfall and the ocean.

All the lower strata below the Cambrian have absolutely no fossil record of life other than some single-celled types such as bacteria and algae.

Still not true, although you're sliding the bar. Read the links I gave you and stop posting the same old gibberish. We've known better for decades now.

That sun explanation is a theory NOT fact:

Of course, the fact that no exception to the law of increasing entropy has ever been observed does not prove such a thing never happened. It simply shows that such ideas are outside the scope of science.

One problem biologists have faced is the apparent contradiction by evolution of the second law of thermodynamics. Systems should decay through time, giving less, not more, order. One legitimate response to this challenge is that life on earth is an open system with respect to energy and therefore the process of evolution sidesteps the law's demands for increasing disorder with timeRoger Lewin, "A Downward Slope to Greater Diversity," Science (Volume 217, Septernber 24, 1982) p. 1239.

In an open system (such as the earth receiving an influx of heat energy from the sun), the entropy always tends to increase, and, as a matter of fact, will usually increase more rapidly than if the system remained closed! An example would be a tornado sweeping through a decaying ghost town or a cast iron wrecking ball imposed on an abandoned building. Anyone familiar with the actual equations of heat flow will know that a simple influx of heat energy into a system increases the entropy of that system; it does not decrease it, as evolution would demand. Opening a system to external energy does not resolve the entropy problem at all, but rather makes it worse!

The statement in integral form, namely that the entropy in an isolated system cannot decrease, can be replaced by its corollary in differential form, which asserts that the quantity of entropy generated locally cannot he negative irrespective of whether the system is isolated or not, and irrespective of whether the process under consideration is irreversible or not.Arnold Sommerfeld, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics (New York Academic Press, 1956), p. 155

Thus entropy in an open system always at least tends to increase, no matter how much external energy. is available to it from the sun or any other source. To offset this tendency, the external energy must somehow be supplied to it, not as raw energy (like a bull in a china shop) but as organizing information. If the energy of the sun somehow is going to transform the non-living molecules of the primeval soup into intricately complex, highly organized, replicating living cells, and then to transmute populations of simple organisms like worms into complex, thinking human beings, then that energy has to be stored and converted into an intricate array of sophisticated machinery by an intricate array of complex codes and programs. If such codes and mechanisms are not available on the earth, then the incoming heat energy will simply disintegrate any organized systems that might accidentally have shown up there.

Evolutionists have hardly even addressed this problem as yet, let alone solved it.

I've got two dozen or more quotes from those that have studied evolution admitting the completely lack of a fossil record. Even evolutionist Gould admits it's a major problem.