The Earth is an open system

[CallMeDave]

Dave, Second request on this, unless I'm mistaken, the list of quotes you have above are a cut and paste from another site that while the primary references are present, it's still a matter of integrity to provide the link or reference to the secondary site that arranged them. Again, it's OK to a limited degree to use cut and pastes or links to support or promote what you're saying. It's not OK to do it without crediting those sources so that others can know who did the original work and where it's coming from. It's OK to pick out a single quote and put that up without referencing the secondary source because that secondary source has added nothing to the value of the presentation. When you take a list of quotes however, you need to reference the secondary source that did the work. I'm serious about this. Please provide the link or references when you do this. Thanks.

No, the quotes from Evolutionists that i submitted were assembled from a variety of places . If you wish to confirm the accuracy of these quotes, the specific PRIMARY source info for each has been provided . (ie: Book Title, volume, page number, et al...)

[sandy_mcd]

Seriously Sandy?
... accepted articles are supposed to be withdrawn only "under exceptional circumstances" such as fraud, errors, ethics violations, and the like.

Yes.
The exceptional circumstances are:
1) Article topic doesn't meet subject matter as specified by journal:

The purpose of Applied Mathematics Letters is to provide a means of rapid publication of research announcements and important but brief applied mathematical papers. Potential contributions include any work involving a novel application or utilization of mathematics, or a development in the methodology of applied mathematics. The journal considers all areas of mathematics as appropriate from number theory to Lie algebras and differential games. All application areas are welcome as well, be it computer science, physics, anthropology, fluid dynamics or any other of the main fields of endeavor where mathematics is used in nontrivial ways.

http://www.journals.elsevier.com/applie ... s-letters/ There is nothing novel in the math applied.
2) The paper is incomplete. There is no link between standard mathematical formulas and the stated conclusions.
3) The paper is nonsense. The unsupported conclusions are contradicted by any elementary thermodynamics textbook.


If anyone disagrees, please explain why rather than just stating an objection.

[Stu]

Two things.

1. You're missing the point -- the article was not retracted due to it's subject matter -- it was removed at the behest of a Darwinist blogger.

2. The Journal apologised and paid $10,000 to Dr. Sewell; they would not have so if they had acted within the boundaries of accepted practise.

[Canuckster1127]

Dave, Second request on this, unless I'm mistaken, the list of quotes you have above are a cut and paste from another site that while the primary references are present, it's still a matter of integrity to provide the link or reference to the secondary site that arranged them. Again, it's OK to a limited degree to use cut and pastes or links to support or promote what you're saying. It's not OK to do it without crediting those sources so that others can know who did the original work and where it's coming from. It's OK to pick out a single quote and put that up without referencing the secondary source because that secondary source has added nothing to the value of the presentation. When you take a list of quotes however, you need to reference the secondary source that did the work. I'm serious about this. Please provide the link or references when you do this. Thanks.

No, the quotes from Evolutionists that i submitted were assembled from a variety of places . If you wish to confirm the accuracy of these quotes, the specific PRIMARY source info for each has been provided . (ie: Book Title, volume, page number, et al...)

OK. I'll take you at your word on that. Thanks.

[Canuckster1127]

Two things.

1. You're missing the point -- the article was not retracted due to it's subject matter -- it was removed at the behest of a Darwinist blogger.

2. The Journal apologised and paid $10,000 to Dr. Sewell; they would not have so if they had acted within the boundaries of accepted practise.

Stu, are you suggesting this is not an isolated instance but rather general policy for scientific peer reviewed publications?

[Stu]

Stu, are you suggesting this is not an isolated instance but rather general policy for scientific peer reviewed publications?

No of course not "general policy", but the environment can be hostile; and pressure groups are in fact quite open about their resistance to anything "design" related. We all know of the Richard Sternberg case.

And then there are plenty others.

[sandy_mcd]

Two things.

1. You're missing the point -- the article was not retracted due to it's subject matter -- it was removed at the behest of a Darwinist blogger.

You are right I don't get your point.
1) The article was approved by a reviewer(s) who obviously were unfamiliar with the field and took the easy out of approving the paper. [When reviewing a paper it is much easier to recommend publication than to analyze the material and write a detailed description of its shortcomings.]
2) Someone more familiar with the subject (I can't find the details, does anyone have any?) pointed out that publishing the paper would subject the journal to ridicule. I don't see where it matters who pointed out the problems (which are major) unless you can show that the complaint originated in malice rather than objection to the content.
Given the problems with the paper, I see no reason to attribute the complaint to anything other valid objections with the paper.

The paper is awful. It isn't some obscure point that reasonable people may disagree on. If Dr Sewell wants to redefine the field of thermodynamics, he needs a much more comprehensive and detailed approach than he has taken. Given that, I don't see how motive can be attributed to anyone who complains about its being published.

[sandy_mcd]

No, the quotes from Evolutionists that i submitted were assembled from a variety of places . If you wish to confirm the accuracy of these quotes, the specific PRIMARY source info for each has been provided . (ie: Book Title, volume, page number, et al...)

[Sorry Canuckster, I had already started on this.]
This is a short list with a number of odd spellings such as "Palenontologists" and "Darwinnian". It seems to have shown up in essentially the same form a few times since 2007 in random places, e.g. http://myreader.co.uk/msg/14015283.aspx or http://webnews.mt.net.mk/dnewsweb.exe?c ... 0080&utag=. That certainly suggests it was typed in rather than copied from another source.
I thought the name Moor was a bit odd, so I looked up this one

" The more one studies paleontology, the more certain one becomes that
evolution is based on FAITH ALONE" -- Evolutionist Prof. T.L. Moor .
Origins ? The Banner of Truth Trust, 1988 page 22.

The real name is apparently Louis T. More and the quote is from his 1925 book.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/quotes/ ... rt1-4.html

Quote #61

"The more one studies paleontology, the more certain one becomes that evolution is based on faith alone; exactly the same sort of faith which it is necessary to have when one encounters the great mysteries of religion." (More, Louis T., "The Dogma of Evolution," Princeton University Press: Princeton NJ, 1925, Second Printing, p.160)

1925? Do we really have to say more?

More was apparently a professor of physics at the University of Cincinnati. He seems to have been most famous as a Newton biographer, and I have found reference to a biography of Robert Boyle as well. I found a used copy of Dogma of Evolution available for a trivial price via an online book search. Since it was so cheap, I decided to go ahead and order it. Perhaps I'll have an interesting update when it arrives [See below].

- Mark VandeWettering

Some info on Dr. More from The Creationists by Ronald Numbers [Numbers, Ronald L., The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism, New York: Knoph, 1992].

On page 72:

. . . Louis T. More (1870-1944), a physicist and dean at the University of Cincinnati who had just written a book, The Dogma of Evolution (1925), protesting the extension of evolution from biology to philosophy, replied that he accepted evolution as a working hypothesis.[2] . . .

That endnote [2] is on page 370:

. . . According to Slosson, L.T. More "admits evolution of a sort and is equally persona non grata to the fundamentalists as he is to the evolutionists.". . .

Of course it does not seem to me very kosher to be quoting a non-biologist from 1925 -- it amazes me that anyone would have the nerve to do this. That is before the development of the Modern Synthesis and before a great many fossils were found.

- Mike Hopkins

I judge this one to be in context. But we still have some problems. As has been already stated this man's field is not relevant and he lived a long time ago. Thumbing through the book one very quickly discovers that Dr. More was a fan of Lamarck and believed in the inheritance of acquired traits. Such a belief in soft inheritance was when Dr. More wrote his book was dying and yet he clearly thought it was the wave of the future. This is the "authority" on the strength of his say-so the creationist would want us to reject evolution?

Let me quote the final paragraph of chapter five on page 184:

Owing to the reverence for Darwin and the blind submission to his views which prevailed for so many years, it was a difficult task to live down Darwin's contempt. Only after facts had multiplied, showing the inadequacy of natural selection, did biologists begin timidly to take Lamarck's doctrine seriously. If one can read the signs aright, we may expect to have an increasing attempt to explain the cause of evolution by the inheritance of aquired traits. The reluctance of the biologists to accept this doctrine does not rest so much on the lack of experimental verification as it does on the fact that Lamarck's cause of variation is fundamentally vitalistic in so far as it acknowledges the influence of the will or desire. To admit such a cause is contrary to scientific and mechanistic monism.

This sound a lot like Phillip Johnson and his "intelligent design" cronies. An examination of this 1925 book might be profitable for critics of the ID movement today.

Dr. More seems to have a poor grasp of relevant history. He writes on page 182 that "It is well know that Lyell had a high estimation of Lamarck's work and theory, and that it had a great influence on him when he wrote his Principles of Geology, . . ." Of course Lyell, in volume II of that work, strongly argued against Lamarck.

- Mike Hopkins

Also see the comment by Wesley R. Elsberry at An evening in the Wood's Hole MBL Library.

[sandy_mcd]

Here's the guy (at least one of them) who apparently complained about article: http://dvunkannon.blogspot.com/2011/03/ ... ewell.html

Here's a simple explanation by a physicist http://scitation.aip.org/journals/doc/A ... 031_1.html introduction

Does the second law of thermodynamics prohibit biological evolution?

The erroneous answer “yes” is sometimes presented in the creationist literature,1,2 and more often in creationist web sites. Henry Morris, for example, finds it “obvious that the Second Law of Thermodynamics constitutes a serious problem to the evolution model” because “every system left to its own devices always tends to move from order to disorder.”1

The creationist argument is that advanced organisms are more orderly than primitive organisms, and hence as evolution proceeds living things become more ordered, that is less disordered, that is less entropic. Because the second law of thermodynamics prohibits a decrease in entropy, it therefore prohibits biological evolution.

This argument rests upon two misconceptions about entropy.

• Disorder is a metaphor for entropy, not a definition for entropy.3,4 Metaphors are valuable only when they are not identical in all respects to their targets. (For example, a map of Caracas is a metaphor for the surface of the Earth at Caracas, in that the map has a similar arrangement but a dissimilar scale. If the map had the same arrangement and scale as Caracas, it would be no easier to navigate using the map than it would be to navigate by going directly to Caracas and wandering the streets.) The metaphor of disorder for entropy is valuable and thus imperfect. For example, take some ice cubes out of your freezer, smash them, toss the shards into a bowl, and then allow the ice to melt. The jumble of ice shards certainly seems more disorderly than the bowl of smooth liquid water, yet the liquid water has the greater entropy.5

• Although the entropy of the universe increases with time, the entropy of any part of the universe can decrease with time, so long as that decrease is compensated by an even larger increase in some other part of the universe.6 For example, any hot cup of coffee left to its own devices on a tabletop decreases in entropy.

(This creationist argument also rests upon the misconception that evolution acts always to produce more complex organisms. In fact evolution acts to produce more highly adapted organisms, which might or might not be more complex than their ancestors, depending upon their environment. For example, most cave organisms and parasites are qualitatively simpler than their ancestors.7 This biological misconception will not be discussed in this article.)

These misconceptions have been pointed out numerous times,8 but here we explicitly and quantitatively answer questions such as “What entropy changes accompany evolution?” and “If the entropy here on Earth is decreasing due to evolution, where is the other piece of the universe where the entropy is increasing?”

[Stu]

You are right I don't get your point.
1) The article was approved by a reviewer(s) who obviously were unfamiliar with the field and took the easy out of approving the paper. [When reviewing a paper it is much easier to recommend publication than to analyze the material and write a detailed description of its shortcomings.]

On what grounds do you make this statement?

And no, just because you disagree with Sewell's conclusions is not good enough.
Your authoritarian approach to peer-review is somewhat worrying.

2) Someone more familiar with the subject (I can't find the details, does anyone have any?) pointed out that publishing the paper would subject the journal to ridicule. I don't see where it matters who pointed out the problems (which are major) unless you can show that the complaint originated in malice rather than objection to the content.
Given the problems with the paper, I see no reason to attribute the complaint to anything other valid objections with the paper.

Clearly you have things mixed up. The "someone more familiar with the subject" was the blogger himself

I find it alarming that you would find it appropriate a Journal break it's own code of conduct on the say-so of nothing more than a rude (read his letter) blogger.

Secondly, the correct method would have been to write a response rather than suppress a peer-reviewed article, instead of undermining procedure.

It's quite simple really, the Journal feared the repercussions of including the paper.
Here is an exchange between a contributer (Ezra Abrams) on his blog and the blogger (David vun Kannon) himself:

Ezra Abrams said...
Not sure I agree with you
I'm a very liberal scientisst who views ID as, at abest, a dishonest way to sneak one particular form of religion into the classroom.
However, the sewell paper passed peer review.
Either the journal has to admit is has no peer review, or the paper has to be published.
To do othewise is to set political concerns (sewell is an idiot) over the well established rules of the game.
In any event, this argument isn't really about facts: the ID people and those who support them are working from psychological motivations (like the loss of rural jobs with the rise of mega factory farms) that have nothing to do with the science of evolution

June 9, 2011 10:10 PM

David vun Kannon said...
Hi Ezra,

I agree with you. If you look at the text of my letter to Dr Rodin, the editor at AML, I did not ask for retraction. I simply expressed dismay at the events. Retraction was Dr Rodin's choice. If you go over to the Retraction Watch blog, you'll find that he retracted other papers at about the same time as well.

Yes, the peer review process broke down. They had attempted to implement some kind of 'rapid review' process and it was taken advantage of. That said, rescinding acceptance due to error seems to be a valid option within the Elsevier publishing process. I think that covers this case.

The paper is awful. It isn't some obscure point that reasonable people may disagree on. If Dr Sewell wants to redefine the field of thermodynamics, he needs a much more comprehensive and detailed approach than he has taken. Given that, I don't see how motive can be attributed to anyone who complains about its being published.

"The paper is awful" is your opinion.
So are you saying the opinions of his peers was worthless and should be dismissed solely on the basis of your (or the blogger) saying so?

Were does it end then.
Are there then only select groups of peers who's opinions are "worthy"?

Here's the guy (at least one of them) who apparently complained about article: http://dvunkannon.blogspot.com/2011/03/ ... ewell.html

No, he was the only person on which the Journal took the action they did.

Here's a simple explanation by a physicist http://scitation.aip.org/journals/doc/A ... 031_1.html introduction

Does the second law of thermodynamics prohibit biological evolution?

The erroneous answer “yes” is sometimes presented in the creationist literature,1,2 and more often in creationist web sites. Henry Morris, for example, finds it “obvious that the Second Law of Thermodynamics constitutes a serious problem to the evolution model” because “every system left to its own devices always tends to move from order to disorder.”1

The creationist argument is that advanced organisms are more orderly than primitive organisms, and hence as evolution proceeds living things become more ordered, that is less disordered, that is less entropic. Because the second law of thermodynamics prohibits a decrease in entropy, it therefore prohibits biological evolution.

This argument rests upon two misconceptions about entropy.

• Disorder is a metaphor for entropy, not a definition for entropy.3,4 Metaphors are valuable only when they are not identical in all respects to their targets. (For example, a map of Caracas is a metaphor for the surface of the Earth at Caracas, in that the map has a similar arrangement but a dissimilar scale. If the map had the same arrangement and scale as Caracas, it would be no easier to navigate using the map than it would be to navigate by going directly to Caracas and wandering the streets.) The metaphor of disorder for entropy is valuable and thus imperfect. For example, take some ice cubes out of your freezer, smash them, toss the shards into a bowl, and then allow the ice to melt. The jumble of ice shards certainly seems more disorderly than the bowl of smooth liquid water, yet the liquid water has the greater entropy.5

• Although the entropy of the universe increases with time, the entropy of any part of the universe can decrease with time, so long as that decrease is compensated by an even larger increase in some other part of the universe.6 For example, any hot cup of coffee left to its own devices on a tabletop decreases in entropy.

(This creationist argument also rests upon the misconception that evolution acts always to produce more complex organisms. In fact evolution acts to produce more highly adapted organisms, which might or might not be more complex than their ancestors, depending upon their environment. For example, most cave organisms and parasites are qualitatively simpler than their ancestors.7 This biological misconception will not be discussed in this article.)

These misconceptions have been pointed out numerous times,8 but here we explicitly and quantitatively answer questions such as “What entropy changes accompany evolution?” and “If the entropy here on Earth is decreasing due to evolution, where is the other piece of the universe where the entropy is increasing?”

Here's the thing about opinions, everyone has one and thinks they're right.
Yes, the explanation is too simple. Dr Sewell responds Poker Entropy and the Theory of Compensation.

But again you are still missing the wider point as expressed by Ezra. The article was pulled based upon political concerns -- accepting a peer-reviewed article for publication and then summarily retracting it based on the hearsay of an internet blogger is beyond unprofessional.

Lastly as I stated earlier: the Journal apologised and paid $10,000 to Dr. Sewell; they would not have so if they had acted within the boundaries of accepted practise.

[Canuckster1127]

Dave, Second request on this, unless I'm mistaken, the list of quotes you have above are a cut and paste from another site that while the primary references are present, it's still a matter of integrity to provide the link or reference to the secondary site that arranged them. Again, it's OK to a limited degree to use cut and pastes or links to support or promote what you're saying. It's not OK to do it without crediting those sources so that others can know who did the original work and where it's coming from. It's OK to pick out a single quote and put that up without referencing the secondary source because that secondary source has added nothing to the value of the presentation. When you take a list of quotes however, you need to reference the secondary source that did the work. I'm serious about this. Please provide the link or references when you do this. Thanks.

No, the quotes from Evolutionists that i submitted were assembled from a variety of places . If you wish to confirm the accuracy of these quotes, the specific PRIMARY source info for each has been provided . (ie: Book Title, volume, page number, et al...)

CallmeDave, did you look at the links that Sandy put up that have your assembled quote in exact form? It appears that you did in fact, cut and paste these quotes verbatim from another source and didn't assemble them yourself but then when called on it, went on to deny that this is what you did.

Dave, are you aware of how it makes you appear and what it does to the validity of your positions and arguments to first of all cut and paste from another source without attribution, but then when called on it to deny that this is what you did and instead appear to claim that you put the quotes together yourself from the primary sources?

Dave, this is a violation of our board's Discussion Guidelines so I'm going to call you on it and as it's the second time this has happened, please consider this a warning and if it continues stronger action will be taken. I'll leave it to you to consider the other implications as to your own integrity and truthfulness and appeal to you to ask if you're unsure. We're not perfect here and it's an easy thing for any of us, myself included to skirt lines of attribution because we're a chat forum and not a formal academic arm, but there are limits and wholescale cut and pastes without attribution and then misrepresenting it when challenged definitely crosses that line.

[sandy_mcd]

It seems to me there are two issues here:
1) Is the article worthy of publication
2) Should the article have been published because it was accepted

So far, Stu has not really discussed the contents of the article and has emphasized the second point, so I will start there.

Should Dr Sewell's article have been published in AML since it was accepted?

Here are two cases:

A) Rules are rules. The article was accepted and must be published, no exceptions. It doesn't matter if the reviewer mistakenly/purposely accepted an unsuitable paper, it has to be published no matter what.
B) According to Stu's comment ""accepted articles are supposed to be withdrawn only "under exceptional circumstances" such as fraud, errors, ethics violations, and the like"". Sorry, but the link to the editorial policy at Elsevier does not work so I do not know what their policy is. But I think this is an exceptional case and the paper should be pulled:
1) The subject does not fit the subject matter of the journal which I posted earlier. It is not an applied math paper.
2) Despite the reviewer's approval, the author's interpretation is rejected by mainstream scientists and there is no discussion in the paper of why everyone else has been wrong for so long.
3) Most of the ideas expressed in this paper have been published elsewhere; journals are for previously unpublished work only.

Comments on other points raised:

1) The article was approved by a reviewer(s) who obviously were unfamiliar with the field and took the easy out of approving the paper. [When reviewing a paper it is much easier to recommend publication than to analyze the material and write a detailed description of its shortcomings.]
On what grounds do you make this statement?

That's hard to explain. It is a judgment call. Clearly the majority of scientists disagree (read the literature). Also the paper is full of inconsistencies with basic thermodynamics. Even if the conclusions are true, these inconsistencies need to be addressed in the paper. They aren't.

And no, just because you disagree with Sewell's conclusions is not good enough.

It's not just me. It is the tens of thousands of people who have studied thermodynamics.

Your authoritarian approach to peer-review is somewhat worrying.

This paper presumably wasn't technically "peer-reviewed". It was written by a mathematician, presumably reviewed by a mathematician, but the subject is science/philosophy. In physics, an editor will not send a paper on geophysics to a plasma physicist to review. Even in a single discipline the subfields are quite different specialties. So why were applied mathematicians reviewing this paper?

It's quite simple really, the Journal feared the repercussions of including the paper.

And what would those repercussions be? Being laughed at by scientists? Shouldn't they be concerned?

So are you saying the opinions of his peers was worthless and should be dismissed solely on the basis of your (or the blogger) saying so?

Yes, the opinions of his mathematical peers on this topic are worthless.
I doubt any blogger is powerful enough to dictate to journals (I'm certainly not); he merely provided a wakeup call for the editor to investigate further.
[And see comment about Elsevier below - who knows what qualifications the reviewer had?]

Were does it end then.
Are there then only select groups of peers who's opinions are "worthy"?

To some extent, yes. That is why some people are called experts. Like most things in life, it is a messy situation - who gets to qualify people as knowledgable in some field? But this is an especially egregious case where someone is proposing to rewrite the second law of thermodynamics (dating back to ~1824).

Yes, the explanation is too simple. Dr Sewell responds Poker Entropy and the Theory of Compensation.

Again,

The requested URL /Faculty/sewell/articles/poker.pdf was not found on this server.

The article was pulled based upon political concerns -- accepting a peer-reviewed article for publication and then summarily retracting it based on the hearsay of an internet blogger is beyond unprofessional.

Lastly as I stated earlier: the Journal apologised and paid $10,000 to Dr. Sewell; they would not have so if they had acted within the boundaries of accepted practise.

Again, do bloggers really have this kind of power? Yes, the Journal apologized - which I feel they shouldn't have. But I suppose $10,000 was less than they would have paid to fight the lawsuit. [And the apology is nowhere I can find.]




http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/lib ... g-elsevier

Why Are We Boycotting Elsevier?
February 24, 2012 - 3:10am
By
Barbara Fister
In my circles, the answer to this question is fairly obvious. But as I was trying to explain to undergraduates how messed up scholarly publishing is, I realized it's hard to grasp unless you already have been bruised by current practices. When you're just learning how information works and have only gotten as far as "you ought to use scholarly sources," it's very puzzling indeed. So I thought I'd try to break it down.
Here are the reasons over 7,000 scholars are boycotting a publisher of over 2,500 scholarly journals.
Elsevier's business model depends on limiting access to our work, and we publish it to make it accessible.
Though other publishers have the same model, Elsevier is really big and has a particularly bad record, so it gets to go first.
Huh. That wasn't as hard as I thought.
What makes it complicated for students is that they don't understand why we would write articles, give them away, and be okay with it showing up on the Internet with a $35 price tag in the first place. Why make it so hard to get scholarly articles when sharing your research findings is the whole point?
In case you're not familiar with the boycott, here's a brief rundown. It started when mathematician and Field medalist Timothy Gowers explained why he would no longer write, review, or do editorial work for Elsevier journals and encouraged others to join him.


Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/lib ... z1oDjrKiNt
Inside Higher Ed

From the paper:

But after we define a sufficiently low threshold, everyone seems to agree that ‘‘natural forces will rearrange atoms into digital computers’’ is a macroscopically describable event that is still extremely improbable from the microscopic point of view, and thus forbidden by the second law

Isn't this just assuming his conclusion? How does this follow from section 2?

[Stu]

It seems to me there are two issues here:
1) Is the article worthy of publication

This paper presumably wasn't technically "peer-reviewed". It was written by a mathematician, presumably reviewed by a mathematician, but the subject is science/philosophy. In physics, an editor will not send a paper on geophysics to a plasma physicist to review. Even in a single discipline the subfields are quite different specialties. So why were applied mathematicians reviewing this paper?

Presumably? So you're basing your dismissal of his peers on assumptions?

Here's the problem -- it was worthy of publication according to his peers.
If every bit of research is pulled on the say-so of links provided by internet bloggers, nothing would get published... ever.

What you are promoting is a science-stopper. If something doesn't fall within the bounds of a particular group-think then it's deemed unworthy. You are promoting suppression rather than debate just like the Church during the bad ol days.

Let's turn this around shall we. Let's say it was you who had a peer-reviewed article accepted for publication -- and subsequently had it retracted solely on the basis of a link to an opposing view supplied by a random internet blogger. How would that go down with you?

I would suggest the world would still be flat, the earth positioned at the center of the universe, life arising spontaneously, and the cell still a "simple lump of albuminous combination of carbon".

So far, Stu has not really discussed the contents of the article and has emphasized the second point.

Ok, let's address the content.
Well it seems you misunderstood the gist of the argument advanced by Dr Sewell's in his article. Importantly, the article is two-pronged, not only does it address entropy but more importantly how the law applies to evolution.

The following is a quote from the video I linked below:

So if we define ‘‘X-entropy’’ to be the entropy associated with any diffusing component X (for example, X might be heat), and, since entropy measures disorder, ‘‘X-order’’ to be the negative of X-entropy, a closer look at the equations for entropy change shows that they not only say that the X-order cannot increase in a closed system, but that they also say that in an open system the X-order cannot increase faster than it is imported through the boundary.
Thus the equations for entropy change do not support the illogical ‘‘compensation’’ idea; instead, they illustrate the tautology that ‘‘if an increase in order is extremely improbable when a system is closed, it is still extremely improbable when the system is open, unless something is entering which makes it not extremely improbable’’.

Importing thermal order into an open system may make the temperature distribution less random, and importing carbon order may make the distrinution less random, but neither makes the formation of computers more probable.

Thus the conclusion: order can increase in an open system not because the laws of probability are suspended when the door is open, but simply because order may walk in through the door.

If we found evidence that DNA entered through the earths atmosphere at some time in the past, then perhaps the appearance of humans on a previously barren planet could be explained without postulating a violation of the second law here. But if all we see entering is radiation and meteorite fragments it seems clear that what is entering through the boundary cannot explain the increase in order observed here.

Here's a video link to just exactly what Dr Sewell is arguing.
A good illustration occurs at 2:00.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=259r-iDckjQ

[sandy_mcd]

First part of comments addressed in previous post.

Ok, let's address the content.
Well it seems you misunderstood the gist of the argument advanced by Dr Sewell's in his article. Importantly, the article is two-pronged, not only does it address entropy but more importantly how the law applies to evolution.

I certainly don't understand his argument. [Quoted post rearranged a bit.]

a video link to just exactly what Dr Sewell is arguing.
A good illustration occurs at 2:00.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=259r-iDckjQ

Just before the tornado video {*}, reference is made to "Basic Physics" on entropy. Presumably Dr Sewell believes the passage he read. I pulled "Basic Physics" 1968 edition by Kenneth Ford from the library. The image below from the video (with ellipses included - just more examples) is on page 454. [My screen capture won't show up so I will pull the text from http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/11/ev ... 52671.html ]

Kenneth Ford, in Basic Physics (Blaisdell Publishing Co., 1968), writes:

Imagine a motion picture of any scene of ordinary life run backward. You might watch...a pair of mangled automobiles undergoing instantaneous repair as they back apart. Or a dead rabbit rising to scamper backward into the woods as a crushed bullet re-forms and flies backward into a rifle.... Or something as simple as a cup of coffee on a table gradually becoming warmer as it draws heat from its cooler surroundings. All of these backward-in-time views and a myriad more that you can quickly think of are ludicrous and impossible for one reason only: they violate the second law of thermodynamics. In the actual scene of events, entropy is increasing. In the time reversed view, entropy is decreasing.

Dr Sewell uses this quote to support his 2nd law paper. But what does the author he quotes say a few pages earlier on page 442 ? [This section was reprinted at http://www.archive.org/stream/reader3tr ... m_djvu.txt]

Whenever we make a gain against the second law by increasing the order or the available energy in one part of a total system, we can be sure we have lost even more in another part of the system. Thanks to the constant input of energy from the sun, the earth remains a lively place and we have nothing to fear from the homogenizing effect of the second law.

This statement contradicts Dr Sewell's assertion in the paper that "Of course the whole idea of compensation, whether by distant or nearby events, makes no sense logically". Dr Sewell does not address why this commonly taught principle is wrong. So even if his argument were correct, the paper should be rejected for an obvious lapse. But maybe I am misinterpreting the physics textbook. What does its author think about entropy and evolution? That life will naturally pop up all over the place. So how does Dr Sewell come to the opposite conclusion? From http://edge.org/q2005/q05_4.html ""What Do You Believe Is True Even Though You Cannot Prove It?""

KENNETH FORD
Physicist; Retired director, American Institute of Physics; Author, The Quantum World

I believe that microbial life exists elsewhere in our galaxy.

I am not even saying "elsewhere in the universe." If the proposition I believe to be true is to be proved true within a generation or two, I had better limit it to our own galaxy. I will bet on its truth there.

I believe in the existence of life elsewhere because chemistry seems to be so life-striving and because life, once created, propagates itself in every possible direction. Earth's history suggests that chemicals get busy and create life given any old mix of substances that includes a bit of water, and given practically any old source of energy; further, that life, once created, spreads into every nook and cranny over a wide range of temperature, acidity, pressure, light level, and so on.

Believing in the existence of intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy is another matter. Good luck to the SETI people and applause for their efforts, but consider that microbes have inhabited Earth for at least 75 percent of its history, whereas intelligent life has been around for but the blink of an eye, perhaps 0.02 percent of Earth's history (and for nearly all of that time without the ability to communicate into space). Perhaps intelligent life will have staying power. We don't know. But we do know that microbial life has staying power.

Now to a supposition: that Mars will be found to have harbored life and harbors life no more. If this proves to be the case, it will be an extraordinarily sobering discovery for humankind, even more so than the view of our fragile blue ball from the Moon, even more so than our removal from the center of the universe by Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton—perhaps even more so than the discovery of life elsewhere in the galaxy.

{*}[and I guess a collapsed house would represent an increase in entropy because of the potential energy transferred to the environment as kinetic energy during the collapse.]

following is a quote from the video I linked below:

So if we define ‘‘X-entropy’’ to be the entropy associated with any diffusing component X (for example, X might be heat), and, since entropy measures disorder, ‘‘X-order’’ to be the negative of X-entropy, a closer look at the equations for entropy change shows that they not only say that the X-order cannot increase in a closed system, but that they also say that in an open system the X-order cannot increase faster than it is imported through the boundary.

OK, where are the calculations to show how much the "X-order" can change for the earth system? "F=ma" is a formula but without putting numbers in you can't say anything about whether the force is sufficient to do anything.

Thus the equations for entropy change do not support the illogical ‘‘compensation’’ idea; instead, they illustrate the tautology that ‘‘if an increase in order is extremely improbable when a system is closed, it is still extremely improbable when the system is open, unless something is entering which makes it not extremely improbable’’.

How do these equations not support the compensation? Where are some numbers showing that evolution requires a greater change than is possible? Dr Sewell is just making assertions. He hasn't demonstrated anything.

Importing thermal order into an open system may make the temperature distribution less random, and importing carbon order may make the distrinution less random, but neither makes the formation of computers more probable.

Why not? Another assertion. What is the probability of computers anyhow?

Thus the conclusion: order can increase in an open system not because the laws of probability are suspended when the door is open, but simply because order may walk in through the door.

How can there be a conclusion? There is no evidence or data here at all.

If we found evidence that DNA entered through the earths atmosphere at some time in the past, then perhaps the appearance of humans on a previously barren planet could be explained without postulating a violation of the second law here. But if all we see entering is radiation and meteorite fragments it seems clear that what is entering through the boundary cannot explain the increase in order observed here.

It maybe "clear" but it certainly isn't supported by anything in the paper. There is no content to this paper.

[Stu]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=259r-iDckjQJust before the tornado video {*}, reference is made to "Basic Physics" on entropy. Presumably Dr Sewell believes the passage he read. I pulled "Basic Physics" 1968 edition by Kenneth Ford from the library. The image below from the video (with ellipses included - just more examples) is on page 454. [My screen capture won't show up so I will pull the text from

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/11/ev ... 52671.html ]Kenneth Ford, in Basic Physics (Blaisdell Publishing Co., 1968), writes:

Imagine a motion picture of any scene of ordinary life run backward. You might watch...a pair of mangled automobiles undergoing instantaneous repair as they back apart. Or a dead rabbit rising to scamper backward into the woods as a crushed bullet re-forms and flies backward into a rifle.... Or something as simple as a cup of coffee on a table gradually becoming warmer as it draws heat from its cooler surroundings. All of these backward-in-time views and a myriad more that you can quickly think of are ludicrous and impossible for one reason only: they violate the second law of thermodynamics. In the actual scene of events, entropy is increasing. In the time reversed view, entropy is decreasing.

Dr Sewell uses this quote to support his 2nd law paper. But what does the author he quotes say a few pages earlier on page 442 ? [This section was reprinted at http://www.archive.org/stream/reader3tr ... m_djvu.txt

Whenever we make a gain against the second law by increasing the order or the available energy in one part of a total system, we can be sure we have lost even more in another part of the system. Thanks to the constant input of energy from the sun, the earth remains a lively place and we have nothing to fear from the homogenizing effect of the second law.

This statement contradicts Dr Sewell's assertion in the paper that "Of course the whole idea of compensation, whether by distant or nearby events, makes no sense logically". Dr Sewell does not address why this commonly taught principle is wrong. So even if his argument were correct, the paper should be rejected for an obvious lapse. But maybe I am misinterpreting the physics textbook.

No you misunderstand his argument and undermine his position through a quote-mine. The actual sentence unfolds like so:

Of course the whole idea of compensation, whether by distant or nearby events, makes no sense logically: an extremely improbable event is not rendered less improbable simply by the occurrence of ‘‘compensating’’ events elsewhere. According to this reasoning, the second law does not prevent scrap metal from reorganizing itself into a computer in one room, as long as two computers in the next room are rusting into scrap metal—and the door is open. (Or the thermal entropy in the next room is increasing, though I am not sure how fast it has to increase to compensate computer construction!)

Provides a whole new perspective in context.

So in essence Sewell is not suggesting the principle is wrong, rather he is saying the principle has been incorrectly applied to evolution. He sums it up as such:

If an increase in order is extremely improbable when a system is closed, it is still extremely improbable when the system is open, unless something is entering which makes it not extremely improbable. The fact that order is disappearing in the next room does not make it any easier for computers (or DNA) to appear in our room— unless this order is disappearing into our room, and then only if it is a type of order that makes the appearance of computers not extremely improbable, for example, computers.

(Here he clarifies the point) Importing thermal order into an open system may make the temperature distribution less random, and importing carbon order may make the carbon distribution less random, but neither makes the formation of computers (or DNA) more probable.

What does its author think about entropy and evolution? That life will naturally pop up all over the place. So how does Dr Sewell come to the opposite conclusion?

From http://edge.org/q2005/q05_4.html ""What Do You Believe Is True Even Though You Cannot Prove It?""
KENNETH FORD
Physicist; Retired director, American Institute of Physics; Author, The Quantum World

I believe that microbial life exists elsewhere in our galaxy.

I am not even saying "elsewhere in the universe." If the proposition I believe to be true is to be proved true within a generation or two, I had better limit it to our own galaxy. I will bet on its truth there.

I believe in the existence of life elsewhere because chemistry seems to be so life-striving and because life, once created, propagates itself in every possible direction. Earth's history suggests that chemicals get busy and create life given any old mix of substances that includes a bit of water, and given practically any old source of energy; further, that life, once created, spreads into every nook and cranny over a wide range of temperature, acidity, pressure, light level, and so on.

Believing in the existence of intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy is another matter. Good luck to the SETI people and applause for their efforts, but consider that microbes have inhabited Earth for at least 75 percent of its history, whereas intelligent life has been around for but the blink of an eye, perhaps 0.02 percent of Earth's history (and for nearly all of that time without the ability to communicate into space). Perhaps intelligent life will have staying power. We don't know. But we do know that microbial life has staying power.

Now to a supposition: that Mars will be found to have harbored life and harbors life no more. If this proves to be the case, it will be an extraordinarily sobering discovery for humankind, even more so than the view of our fragile blue ball from the Moon, even more so than our removal from the center of the universe by Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton—perhaps even more so than the discovery of life elsewhere in the galaxy.

I'm not sure I understand your reason for including this?

It's a guess made on his personal philosophy that life is the product of nothing but chance. I could repeat the exact same text and replace "life" with "no life".
It's what he hopes is out there in accordance with his world-view. We have no idea whatsoever of how a self-replicating first-life began -- his assumptions that life is out are just that, guesswork.

{*}[and I guess a collapsed house would represent an increase in entropy because of the potential energy transferred to the environment as kinetic energy during the collapse.

Let's take a closer look at the house.
According to your reasoning, having a tornado assemble a house as it did (2:00 in the vid) is an event well within the boundaries of reason -- because what in fact occurs is a decrease in entropy, as the tornado receives it's energy from the sun, and the increase in entropy on the sun is far more than the decrease unfolding during the assembly of the house.

So effectively, tornado's "under just the right conditions" can construct a house (keeping mind a self-replicating organism is far more complex than a house).

OK, where are the calculations to show how much the "X-order" can change for the earth system? "F=ma" is a formula but without putting numbers in you can't say anything about whether the force is sufficient to do anything.

How do these equations not support the compensation? Where are some numbers showing that evolution requires a greater change than is possible? Dr Sewell is just making assertions. He hasn't demonstrated anything.

You're missing his point, it's the nature and content of the exchange in entropy and how it applies to evolution.

Importing thermal order into an open system may make the temperature distribution less random, and importing carbon order may make the distrinution less random, but neither makes the formation of computers more probable.

Why not? Another assertion. What is the probability of computers anyhow?

Are you serious?
Could you clarify.

If we found evidence that DNA entered through the earths atmosphere at some time in the past, then perhaps the appearance of humans on a previously barren planet could be explained without postulating a violation of the second law here. But if all we see entering is radiation and meteorite fragments it seems clear that what is entering through the boundary cannot explain the increase in order observed here.

It maybe "clear" but it certainly isn't supported by anything in the paper. There is no content to this paper.

So what you're saying is that despite the fact we have to suspend all logic when applying the second law to evolution (and the tornado/house), Sewell's assertions should be ignored as a point of discussion.

For me the problem here is that you are willing to suspend all logic.

Remember; the law of gravity itself has recently come into question (our current understanding might be correct on smaller scales but on larger scales it seems the law could need a second look). Laws have continually been readjusted (and even discarded) throughout the history of science.

There's a reason he named it "a second look" and not "a discarding of the second law".

What is more likely -- that the second law apparantly permits for entirely improbable events requiring the suspension of logic and reason, such as a tornado's ability to assemble a house; or the law has been applied incorrectly.

Remember, life on earth is the exception rather than the rule; we're an anomaly relating to the second law.

Or perhaps we're not an anomaly after all; and the coalescing of atoms into nucleotides and amino acids, into RNA, DNA and proteins, along with the library of information required to fucntion, is indeed a violation of the second law.

Don't you think a "second look" is warranted given the fact that if we do apply the law as you suggest, some highly implausible events are likely to occur. If applying the law without question manifests scenario's that defy logic and common sense, like tornado's assembling a house, then perhaps it is time for a second look.

Here's Dr Sewell's conclusion.

Of course, one can still argue that the spectacular increase in order seen on Earth does not violate the second law because what has happened here is not really extremely improbable. Not many people are willing to make this argument, however; in fact, the claim that the second law does not apply to open systems was invented in an attempt to avoid having to make this argument. And perhaps it only seems extremely improbable, but really is not, that, under the right conditions, the influx of stellar energy into a planet could cause atoms to rearrange themselves into nuclear power plants and spaceships and digital computers. But one would think that at least this would be considered an open question, and those who argue that it really is extremely improbable, and thus contrary to the basic principle underlying the second law of thermodynamics, would be given a measure of respect, and taken seriously by their colleagues, but we are not.