Applying Boltzmanns perspective of the second law, the change of state from a more probable, less ordered, and higher entropy arrangement to one of less probability, more order, and lower entropy (as is seen in biological ordering) calls for a function like that known of DNA.Research concerning the relationship between the thermodynamic quantity entropy and the evolution of life began around the turn of the 20th century.
In 1910, American historian Henry Adams printed and distributed to university libraries and history professors the small volume A Letter to American Teachers of History proposing a theory of history based on the second law of thermodynamics and on the principle of entropy. In his book, Schrdinger originally stated that life feeds on negative entropy, or negentropy as it is sometimes called, but in a later edition corrected himself in response to complaints and stated that the true source is free energy. In 1875, building on the works of Clausius and Kelvin, Boltzmann reasoned. McCulloh then goes on to show that these two laws may be combined in a single expression as follows. Nor should it, therefore, be a matter of surprise that already, in the short space of time, not yet one generation, elapsed since the mechanical theory of heat has been freely adopted, whole branches of physical science have been revolutionized by it. His first example is physiology, wherein he states that the body of an animal, not less than a steamer, or a locomotive, is truly a heat engine, and the consumption of food in the one is precisely analogous to the burning of fuel in the other; in both, the chemical process is the same: that called combustion. He then incorporates a discussion of Antoine Lavoisier s theory of respiration with cycles of digestion, excretion, and perspiration, but then contradicts Lavoisier with recent findings, such as internal heat generated by friction, according to the new theory of heat, which, according to McCulloh, states that the heat of the body generally and uniformly is diffused instead of being concentrated in the chest. McCulloh then gives an example of the second law, where he states that friction, especially in the smaller blood vessels, must develop heat. Undoubtedly, some fraction of the heat generated by animals is produced in this way. He then asks: but whence the expenditure of energy causing that friction, and which must be itself accounted for. It is likely that McCulloh modeled parts of this argument on that of the famous Carnot cycle. In conclusion, he summarizes his first and second law argument as such. But this highly technical term seemed linguistically too near to energy for making the average reader alive to the contrast between the two things. In this direction, although lifes dynamics may be argued to go against the tendency of the second law, life does not in any way conflict with or invalidate this law, because the principle that entropy can only increase or remain constant applies only to a closed system which is adiabatically isolated, meaning no heat can enter or leave, and the physical and chemical processes which make life possible do not occur in adiabatic isolation, i.e. Whenever a system can exchange either heat or matter with its environment, an entropy decrease of that system is entirely compatible with the second law. While energy from nutrients is necessary to sustain an organisms order, Schrdinger also presciently postulated the existence of other molecules equally necessary for creating the order observed in living organisms: An organisms astonishing gift of concentrating a stream of order on itself and thus escaping the decay into atomic chaos of drinking orderliness from a suitable environment seems to be connected with the presence of the aperiodic solids. We now know that this aperiodic crystal is DNA, and that its irregular arrangement is a form of information. The DNA in the cell nucleus contains the master copy of the software, in duplicate. This software seems to control by specifying an algorithm, or set of instructions, for creating and maintaining the entire organism containing the cell. Nutrition is necessary but not sufficient to account for growth in size, as genetics is the governing factor. The controlling factor must be internal and not nutrients or sunlight acting as causal exogenous variables. Organisms inherit the ability to create unique and complex biological structures; it is unlikely for those capabilities to be reinvented or to be taught to each generation. Therefore, DNA must be operative as the prime cause in this characteristic as well.
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