Entropy and Equilibrium
Entropy: the tendency for matter in a system to move to a state of disorder.
If a group of similar molecules, with different energies and charges, are put into a perfectly insulated container, the molecules will attain equal distribution of energy and charge within the container.
The number and properties of the molecules in any set volume of the container will be the same as any other same volume of the container. This homogenous state is what is considered disorder? What would be an ordered state?
The action of molecules to transfer energy and equalize is not a tendency to disorder but an effort to become uniform. Equilibrium is a ordering of a system not it becoming chaotic. The laws of thermodynamics are a description of how this ordering of a system works. To try and morph entropy onto these laws is like passing a law that says you must disobey the laws. It is idiocy.
The theory of entropy is not a basic law of physics but defies all observation. The atom, solar system, galaxies, and galaxy clusters all seem to be stable ordered systems that remain the same for billions of years. Any changes in these systems are rare and are not the result a spontaneous deterioration of the systems but from the interaction of some other system.
If there is a crowd of people in an area there appears to be complete disorder but each person in the crowd has his own motivation directing their actions. If a police officer arrives he will use his control to bring some order to the crowd as his motivation now takes precedence over the motivation of the individuals in the crowd. If a general takes control of the crowd it will become an army with its actions directed to a common goal as directed by the general.
In the universe there are various centers, units, of controlling energy that direct the movement of matter (atoms, molecules, planets, solar systems, galaxies, etc.) that are under their control. If a part of a unit, like an electron, leaves its controlling energy field in the atom its movement and direction will then be determined by the larger energy field controlling that system/unit. When the Voyager satellites left the energy of our solar system they became a part of the Milky Way’s energy unit and their movement, velocity, and position were referenced to that energy rather than the sun.
The apparent disorder observed in systems is result of matter moving into a different controlling energy field and a redirection of its effort to equalize with that energy field.
A meteor entering the Earth’s energy field is not being destroyed by the atmosphere. Most of them self destruct before they reach the atmosphere. They are being destroyed by trying to equalize with the Earth’s smaller energy field by losing the energy acquired from the sun’s energy field.
The theory of entropy is crap. There is no tendency for matter to move to a state of disorder but a directive to move to an equalization or order with the controlling energy field they are a part of.
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jerry krause
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Hi Readers,
This comment has nothing to do with Herb’s posting. But I just discovered the following ‘No, Increasing CO2 isn’t going to trigger a hot world without clouds.’
March 1st, 2019
“I’ve received many more requests about the new disappearing-clouds study than the “gold standard proof of anthropogenic warming” study I addressed here, both of which appeared in Nature journals over the last several days.”
I havNo, Increasing CO2 isn’t going to trigger a hot world without clouds.
March 1st, 2019 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
I’ve received many more deleted the author’s name because the following comment, which I made at this other blogsite, was not posted. But based on the post and the comments relative to it, it seems clear that all these authors are not familiar with what readers of PSI should be aware. But I submit my comment here to illustrate the great problem which exists in SCIENCE today. Good SCIENCE requires the free flow of ideas. And John O’Sullivan goes to the extreme to allow this to happen.
Hi Roy and readers,
Clouds are my thing and actual hour by hour data is the basis of my study.
As I read Roy’s post and your comments, it seems evident that neither Roy or any writing comments are familiar of the following land based projects which allow one to really ‘see’ the actual influence of cloud upon the air, the surface, and the soil temperatures.
https://raws.dri.edu/
https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/uscrn/products/hourly02/
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/surfrad/dataplot.html
https://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/scan/
A sample of what you might find can be found here.
https://principia-scientific.com/the-corvallis-or-uscrn-site-a-natural-laboratory
https://principia-scientific.com/the-corvallis-or-uscrn-site-a-natural-laboratory-part-two/
Have a good day, Jerry
Reply
jerry krause
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Hi Readers,
This comment has nothing to do with Herb’s posting. But I just discovered the following ‘No, Increasing CO2 isn’t going to trigger a hot world without clouds.’
March 1st, 2019
“I’ve received many more requests about the new disappearing-clouds study than the “gold standard proof of anthropogenic warming” study I addressed here, both of which appeared in Nature journals over the last several days.”
I’ve deleted the author’s name because the following comment, which I made at this other blogsite, was not posted. But based on the post and the comments relative to it, it seems clear that all these authors are not familiar with what readers of PSI should be aware. But I submit my comment here to illustrate the great problem which exists in SCIENCE today. Good SCIENCE requires the free flow of ideas. And John O’Sullivan goes to the extreme to allow this to happen.
Clouds are my thing and actual hour by hour data is the basis of my study.
As I read XXXX’s post and your comments, it seems evident that neither XXXX or any writing comments are familiar of the following land based projects which allow one to really ‘see’ the actual influence of cloud upon the air, the surface, and the soil temperatures.
https://raws.dri.edu/
https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/uscrn/products/hourly02/
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/surfrad/dataplot.html
https://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/scan/
A sample of what you might find can be found here.
https://principia-scientific.com/the-corvallis-or-uscrn-site-a-natural-laboratory
https://principia-scientific.com/the-corvallis-or-uscrn-site-a-natural-laboratory-part-two/
Have a good day, Jerry
Reply
jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
“If a group of similar molecules, with different energies and charges, are put into a perfectly insulated container, the molecules will attain equal distribution of energy and charge within the container.”
This situation which you define is totally artificial and even it suffers the problem there is no such thing as a perfectly insulated container.
“The atom, solar system, galaxies, and galaxy clusters all seem to be stable ordered systems that remain the same for billions of years.” How does this statement fit with that same days it rains and other days it does not. Or that the observed evidence seems quite conclusive that the northern portions of the Northern Hemisphere we once, or more often even, covered with glaciers. Or, how is it during one 24hr period that a diurnal air temperature oscillation is commonly observed to occur. And even these diurnal temperature oscillation are not identical from period to period.
Herb, you cannot just imagine a world that does not even approach the uniformity you claim to exist on macroscopic scale which can be easily observed. To say nothing about the microscopic world which we cannot view with our natural senses.
In the chemistry classes I taught I was prepared to refute the argument that the plants are evidence that prove matter can be spontaneously ordered. Which is the disordering is occurring in the sun which is the source of the energy usually considered essential for plant growth.
Herb,, please use you senses more and your mind less for imagining wonderful things that maybe do not exist.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hi Jerry,
The fact that there is no perfect insulation does not negate the argument. You, as a chemist, make an assumption that all the atoms of an element are the same and behave the same even though you know that it is not true. You use an average of an element’s molecular weight, even though you know that no such atom exists (since the molecular weight of an atom must be a multiple of the mass of a neutron) to do the calculations for your experiments.. With different masses different atoms of the same element react differently and results are not uniform. Everyone uses generalities to try to describe what is happening in different conditions even though is understood that identical conditions will not necessarily produce identical results.
I should have called the article Entropy versus Equilibrium because the question I was addressing is, Do systems try to become more random or more ordered? Entropy is like a stone wall constructed of uncut stone while equilibrium is like a cinder block wall where every part is made uniform. To me the preponderance of stable repeated ordered systems of all sizes indicates that the direction is towards uniformity not diversity.
The weather, glacier eras, rain patterns are all a result of the atmosphere and Earth trying to equalize with the energy from the sun. At night the atmosphere receives less energy and loses energy to equalize with the reduced energy. The Earth, being a sphere, receives different amounts of energy in different areas and the equalization of this energy causes weather. The weather which appears so random is a result of energy flowing to become uniform. If the Earth was not tilted what would our weather be like?
The fact that there are regular repeating patterns of weather and climate, even though the conditions may seem erratic in the short term, I believe, shows the fundamental direction of something even as random as the weather is towards equilibrium rather than a more disorganized state.
The variations and randomness we observe are a result of changes in the organizing energy source objects encounter. Why is there an asteroid belt instead of a planet between Mars and Jupiter? Is this aberration in the solar system a result of Jupiter’s gravitational field preventing the matter from equalizing with the suns gravitational field?
Jerry it is the questioning of why things behave as they do instead of just accepting data as unconnected phenomena that changed alchemy into the science of chemistry.
Have a good day,
Herb
Reply
jerry krause
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Hi Readers and Herb,
Even before I came to read what was new, I had concluded that Herb was not the idiot he seemed to be. By making his absurd statements he makes us recognize what cannot be true. Which is a step in the right direction in discovering what might be true. But if one is a good scientist one must also recognize, as the most successful scientists have stated, that SCIENCE can never prove what is true.
Hence, Herb, you are brilliant. And, to my credit, I have acknowledged that you have caused me to ponders and thereby ‘seemingly’ better understand the data which I try to study when it is available. Even though, at that time, I still considered you to be an idiot. But no more do I consider you to be an idiot.
You just concluded: “Jerry it is the questioning of why things behave as they do instead of just accepting data as unconnected phenomena that changed alchemy into the science of chemistry.”
Horace de Saussure (1740-1799) has to have been the first ‘alchemist’ meteorologist. He invented several instruments to make quantitative observations (data). But he did not invent the barometer. Who poured liquid mercury into a glass tube, sealed at one end, until it was full, and then carefully turned it over so not a bubble of air floated up through the dense mercury as bottom of the filled tube was placed in a pool of mercury. Of course we know it was Evangelista Torricelli (1608 –1647), an Italian physicist and mathematician, best known for his invention of the barometer. (Wikepedia)
Here, I had considered that Isaac Newton (1642-1727) was the first physicist and as chemist I know he was also an alchemist although he did not ‘professionally’ get involved in the early controversies of what was ‘matter’. Or maybe, Galileo Galilei, before Newton. But if you read Galileo’s classic book you find he knew about the observations of alchemists, if he was not one himself.
And I can ask the question: Where did Torricelli get the mercury? For even before this morning I had been pondering: What had Torricelli observed that led him to pour the mercury into that glass tube? And now another question popped into my mind: Where did Torricelli get the glass tube?
Some people seem to have prejudges about those stupid Alchemists who were trying to change mercury or lead (dense metals) into gold.
I am not being critical of you, Herb. I am only trying to correct this prejudice about my professional ancestors.
I need to go exercise (run) now but I will be back because you have just reviewed what I consider to be quite important and fundamental facts. A question for you to ponder: Can anything be considered an observed fact?
Have a good day, Jerry
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Horace de Saussure
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Herb Rose: Idiot or Genius? Although some think he spouts nonsense because he suffers from bipolar hygroscopic dysphoria with attendant thermomophobia and tropospheric topsy-turvy kinetic heat delusions, and that he may have recently developed entropic disequilibrium disorder, or that he agrees with those who think him simple-minded, or that some commentators (bless his little Cotton socks) are convinced that dear ol’ ‘erb really is an (unlovable?) idiot, the truth probably lies somewhere between these two extremes. Latest PSI-reader estimates and recent straw polling put Herb’s IQ within one standard deviation of the mean. Harsh assessments or not, it’s surely much higher than your average, silly old duffer, water-divining, “How Stupid Am I?,” retired community college teacher and persistent, squabbling, rambling and bumbling, PSI irritant with a fixation on my hot box. Whatever would Galileo, Einstein, Feynman and R.C. Sutcliffe have to say? No doubt we’ll soon find out.
As we French-speaking Swiss are thankfully wont not to say:
Passez un bonne journée,
Horace
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jerry krause
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Hi Readers and Herb.
Leg hurt too badly, so it seemed wise not to run. So I am back before I planned.
The present is so arrogant that they forget to ask: How did we get here?
I have never taken a formal academic course in any of the ‘environmental’ sciences. But I have read introductory textbooks (or monographs) of meteorology, climatology, and physical geography. But Weather and Climate (1966) by R. C. Sutcliffe is my most respected reference. This even though I at times I dismiss (disagree with) what he wrote. For his is a very honest book. I have read someone who criticized him for uncritically merely reviewing that which was the existing knowledge of that time. For this was the purpose of the book which immediately described in the preface.
In the second sentence of his introduction, Sutcliffe wrote: It is then not unreasonable to suppose, indeed it could hardly be otherwise, that the problems presented by weather, by wind and rain and warmth, were amongst the earliest to force themselves on conscious and that in the historic sense meteorology lay at the foundation of physical science. It was, and is, a difficult science to reduce to its basic principles and so present as a deductive structure [I still do not know what a ‘deductive structure’ is]. But I know when the very logical Europeans began to explore the ‘modern’ world they found many ‘primitive’ aborigine people with prehistoric ancestors who had survived in the most extreme climates and invented tools, clothing, shelters, and weapons which allowed them to survive in a hostile world.
In 1983, when I was the only chemistry instructor at a small community college, Lauren B Resnick, a cognitive scientist who studied the learning process, wrote a short, less than two pages, article the an April issue of Science.
She wrote: In physics and other science, according to these studies, even students who do well on textbook problems often cannot apply the laws and formulas they been drilled on to interpreting actual physical events. This observation has been made on all kinds of students, including gifted middle-school children and students at some of our most prestigious universities.”
“Another well-supported finding is that all students, the weak as well as the strong learners, come to their first science classes with surprising extensive theories about how the natural world works. They use these “naïve” theories to explain real world events before they have had any science instruction. Then, even after instruction in new concepts and scientifically supported theories, they still resort to their prior theories to solve any problems that vary from their textbook example.”
“Several studies show that successful problem-solving requires a substantial amount of qualitative reasoning. Good problem-solvers do not rush in to apply a formula or an equation. Instead they try to understand the problem situation; they consider alternative representations and relations among the variables. Only when they are satisfied that they understand the situation and all the variables in it in a qualitative way do they start to apply the quantifications that we often mistakenly identify as the essence of “real” science or mathematics.”
What may not be obvious in these quotes is what the ‘real world events’ might be. I claim these ‘real world events’ are observed data (whether it be qualitative observations or quantitative measurements). This data is the ‘variables’. SCIENCE is only based upon observations (data) and not “naïve” theories.
Herb, your turn.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hi Jerry,
What data is chosen to be observed is based on theory and its relevance is determined by how it fits theory.
Here’s another quack theory you might want to consider in your studies of weather. If you now agree with Jame’s theory of water being in the form of nano droplets instead of a gas wouldn’t”this make water the major factor in the distribution oh energy/heat in the atmosphere? The current theories I know (this area is your expertise not mine) concentrate on the gases in the atmosphere and treat water as a minor contaminate playing a minor role. If water in the atmosphere is in the form of droplets of various sizes then I would think that it is the major factor in heat distribution and weather.
Studying temperatures of the gases in the atmosphere (which you know I believe to be inaccurate) is collecting data that is misleading and plays a minor role in weather. Since you are far more knowledgable than I on the subject I will leave it to you to determine if the limited success of meteorology is a result of bad data collected because of a fundamental mistake of theory.
Have a good day,
Herb
Reply
jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
“What data is chosen to be observed is based on theory and its relevance is determined by how it fits theory.”
So you believe a theory is to explain the observation. That is right as Einstein proposed that light was quantized (photons) to explain the photo electric effect.
“If you now agree with Jame’s theory of water being in the form of nano droplets instead of a gas wouldn’t”this make water the major factor in the distribution oh energy/heat in the atmosphere?” Sutcliffe explained that that the atmosphere must contain particles (maybe droplets of impure water even) of condensed matter (solid or liquid) to explain the fact that the atmosphere has never been observed to be super-saturated with with water vapor (understood by chemists and meteorologists as water molecules).
If you and James insist of speaking the ‘truth’ instead admitting there are simple instruments, like thermometer, which you and your bodies (even with your brilliant minds) cannot measure, that is your problem even though I feel sorry that you seem to have this problem.
Have a good day and keep some of the readers pondering (questioning) if I am right about you being brilliant, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hi Jerry,
According to my understanding of James” theory, as energy is added to water droplets the hydrogen bonds break forming smaller droplets and absorbing energy. When energy levels drop (cooling) the hydrogen bonds reform forming larger droplets and releasing energy (heat).
The belief that droplets only form around impurities is not accurate. Clouds form at the top of the boundary between the troposphere and stratosphere. When they fall as rain they would carry these particles of matter back to the Earth’s surface and absorb other particles in the atmosphere as they fell. How can you explain the continuous replenishment of these particles at the top of the troposphere when you have days of rain washing them out of the atmosphere and creating mud? How do clouds form over the ocean forming hurricanes, where the clouds move west over open water away from any source of particles?
The thermometer is a simple instrument that absorbs heat and has a fluid expand to indicate that absorbed heat. It is designed with a set area to be exposed to the medium being measured while the rest of the thermometer radiates heat allowing it to reach equilibrium. As you stated before the thermometer is calibrated by exposing its measuring area to ice water and boiling water. If you only expose one millionth of the measuring area to the medium being measured how can you get n accurate reading? In the atmosphere the number of molecules transferring heat to the measuring area is one millionth that of water..
Jerry, no one has accused me of being brilliant before. Most people believe I am simple minded, which I can agree with because I believe answers should be simple and easy to understand.
Have a good day,
Herb
T L Winslow
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[[The number and properties of the molecules in any set volume of the container will be the same as any other same volume of the container. This homogenous state is what is considered disorder? What would be an ordered state?]]
Duh, the Big Bang happened when the U was in its most ordered state, and ever since it’s been getting more disordered, one day to end in its thermal death, AKA energy everywhere, but not one drop to do work with 🙂
On a more personal scale:
A person in a big water tank who blows up will leave a less ordered glob of floating cells 🙂
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Herb Rose
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H:i T.L.,
And yet when we look into space we see giant clouds of dust condensing into stars and solar systems and the origin of people started as a glob of floating cells that condensed into larger organisms.
Have a good day,
Herb
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Geraint Hughes
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Are you sure the big bang happened. There is a growing body of proof that the background radiation doesn’t exist. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8ijbu3bSqI
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jerry krause
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Hi Doug,
I write this to see if you will respond and if you do, how you will respond.
Question: Is there much difference between you, Herb, or James McGinn?
Yes, of the three, you try to explain the accepted puzzle of the extreme surface temperature of Venus.
But it seems in your theory you ignore the presence of its cloud deck. I have recently written a comment, I no longer remember where, to which I do remember that you did not respond. And if my memory is wrong you can point me to where you did.
Now that I have finally discovered the USA government projects which measure and report fundamental meteorological and radiation measurements, which clearly demonstrate the influence of cloud, upon the earth’s natural systems, I have never read one of comments relative to my essays which have been posted.
So, how are you really different from Herb and James?
Have a good day, Jerry
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