🚀 go-pugleaf

On Jun 27, 7:26 am, Pentcho Valev <pva...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Postscientism: There are systems that do violate the second law of
> thermodynamics (so that chosen "heretics" can make career and money).
> On the other hand, the second law of thermodynamics cannot be violated
> (so that the rest of the establishment can sleep well):
>
> http://www.physorg.com/news165065343.html
> "Scientists have found that Maxwell's demon, or a creature that can
> sometimes decrease the entropy of a system without performing work,
> could exist in nanoscale systems, although it would not violate any
> physical law....Maxwell's demon may be making a comeback. Physicists
> know that the demon, an imaginary creature that decreases the entropy
> of a system, cannot exist in macroscopic systems due to the energy it
> requires to perform its role. However, a recent study has shown that,
> on the nanoscale, Maxwell's demon might be able to do its work with
> much less energy than previously thought due to tiny thermal
> fluctuations that occur in small systems."

Postscientism: The law of entropy increase holds "the SUPREME POSITION
among the laws of Nature". The law of entropy increase is "a RED
HERRING". The "scientific community" is happy with both views:

http://web.mit.edu/keenansymposium/overview/background/index.html
Arthur Eddington: "The law that entropy always increases, holds, I
think, the SUPREME POSITION among the laws of Nature. If someone
points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in
disagreement with Maxwell's equations - then so much the worse for
Maxwell's equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation
- well, these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your
theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics, I can
give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest
humiliation."

http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000313/
Jos Uffink: "The historian of science and mathematician Truesdell made
a detailed study of the historical development of thermodynamics in
the period 1822 - 1854. He characterises the theory, even in its
present state, as 'a dismal swamp of obscurity' and 'a prime example
to show that physicists are not exempt from the madness of crowds'. He
is outright cynical about the respect with which nonmathematicians
treat the Second Law: "Clausius verbal statement of the second law
makes no sense [. . . ]. All that remains is a Mosaic prohibition; a
century of philosophers and journalists have acclaimed this
commandment; a century of mathematicians have shuddered and averted
their eyes from the unclean. Seven times in the past thirty years have
I tried to follow the argument Clausius offers [. . . ] and seven
times has it blanked and gravelled me. [. . . ] I cannot explain what
I cannot understand." From this anthology it emerges that although
many prominent physicists are firmly convinced of, and express
admiration for the Second Law, there are also serious complaints,
especially from mathematicians, about a lack of clarity and rigour in
its formulation. At the very least one can say that the Second Law
suffers from an image problem: its alleged eminence and venerability
is not perceived by everyone who has been exposed to it. What is it
that makes this physical law so obstreperous that every attempt at a
clear formulation seems to have failed? Is it just the usual
sloppiness of physicists? Or is there a deeper problem? And what
exactly is the connection with the arrow of time and irreversibility?
Could it be that this is also just based on bluff? Perhaps readers
will shrug their shoulders over these questions. Thermodynamics is
obsolete; for a better understanding of the problem we should turn to
more recent, statistical theories. But even then the questions we are
about to study have more than a purely historical importance. The
problem of reproducing the Second Law, perhaps in an adapted version,
remains one of the toughest, and controversial problems in statistical
physics.....This summary leads to the question whether it is fruitful
to see irreversibility or time-asymmetry as the essence of the second
law. Is it not more straightforward, in view of the unargued
statements of Kelvin, the bold claims of Clausius and the strained
attempts of Planck, to give up this idea? I believe that Ehrenfest-
Afanassjewa was right in her verdict that the discussion about the
arrow of time as expressed in the second law of the thermodynamics is
actually a RED HERRING."

Pentcho Valev
pvalev@yahoo.com