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A Philosophical Case For Holding That The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is Only a Special Law of Nature, and Not a Universal Law
[L]iving matter, while not eluding the “laws of physics” as established up to date, is likely to involve “other laws of physics” hitherto unknown, which however, once they have been revealed, will form just as integral a part of science as the former. (Schrödinger, 1944: p. 73)
Let us see whether we cannot draw the correct non-contradictory conclusion from the following two premises:
(i) My body functions as a pure mechanism according to Laws of Nature; and
(ii) Yet I know, by incontrovertible direct experience, that I am directing its motions, of which I foresee the effects, that may be fateful and all-important, in which case I feel and take full responsibility for them.
The only possible inference from these two facts is, I think, that I—I in the widest meaning of the word, that is to say, every conscious mind that has ever said or felt “I”—am the person, if any, who controls the “motion of the atoms” according to the Laws of Nature. (Schrödinger, 1944: pp. 92-93)
Consciousness is never experienced in the plural, only in the singular…. Consciousness finds itself intimately connected with, and dependent on, the physical state of a limited region of matter, the body…. The only possible alternative [to the thesis that there is a plurality of consciousnesses] is to keep to the immediate experience that consciousness is the singular of which the plural is unknown; that there is only one thing and that what seems to be a plurality is merely a series of different aspects of this one thing, produced by a deception…. What is this “I”? If you analyse it closely, you will, I think, find that it is just a little bit more than a collection of single data (memories and experiences), namely the canvas upon which they are collected. And you will, on close introspection, find that what you really mean by “I” is that ground-stuff upon which they are collected. (Schrödinger, 1944: pp. 94-96)
In physics, entropy is the unavailability of thermal energy for conversion into causal action or work. Sometimes, entropy is described as “disorder,” but this is conceptually misleading: actually, an increase in entropy is an increase in the amount of thermal energy that’s in a cold or causally inert state, hence it’s an overall ordering or structuring of thermal energy that’s less complex, less differentiated, and less variegated—as it were, a more boring ordering or structuring of thermal energy, a dispersal of thermal energy—whereby the natural universe is in a partial or total equilibrium state, i.e., a partially or totally settled state, with nothing coming in or going out across the impermeable borders of that state, such that nothing can be be done or happen. Now, when natural systems spontaneously evolve so that they causally operate entropically, let’s call that natural mechanism.
Contrariwise, negative entropy or negentropy is the negation or reversal of entropy, hence it’s the availability of thermal energy for conversion into causal action or work, sometimes also called “free energy,” or “order,” but those labels are also conceptually misleading; actually, an increase in negentropy is an increase in the amount of thermal energy that’s in a hot or causally empowered state, hence it’s an overall ordering or structuring of thermal energy that’s more complex, more differentiated, and more variegated—as it were, a more exciting ordering or structuring of thermal energy, a concentration of thermal energy—whereby the natural universe is in a partial or total non-equilibrium state, i.e., a partially or totally unsettled state, with things coming in and going out across the permeable membranes of that state, such that things can be done or happen. Now, when natural systems spontaneously evolve so that they causally operate negentropically, let’s call that natural creativity.
According to the Standard Models of cosmology and particle physics, and more specifically, according to The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics,
(i) in the spontaneous evolution of a closed or isolated natural system, entropy is never negated or reversed, but only ever either stays the same or increases (although it is possible to reduce the rate of its increase, for example, by lowering temperature), and
(ii) the natural universe is a closed system, hence
(iii) in the natural universe, entropy is never negated or reversed, but only ever either stays the same or increases (although it’s possible to reduce the rate of its increase), i.e., The 2nd Law is a universal natural law.
In thinking about The 2nd Law, it’s crucial to recognize the categorical distinction between,
on the one hand, merely decreasing entropy, i.e., merely reducing the rate of increase of entropy, and
on the other hand, negentropy, i.e., negating or reversing entropy.
This distinction is precisely analogous or parallel to the distinction in simplified, non-thermal dynamics between,
on the one hand, deceleration, i.e., reducing the rate of increase of velocity by applying a counterforce (say, by putting on the brakes in your car while accelerating and driving from left to right –>), and
on the other hand, negative acceleration, i.e., reducing the rate of increase of velocity by accelerating in the intrinsically opposite direction in an orientable spatial coordinate system (say, by putting your car in reverse and thereby driving from right to left <– in that system, instead of from left to right –>).
Like acceleration, which is a spatial vector whose components are increasing velocity and intrinsic directionality in orientable space, so too entropy is a temporal vector whose components are increasing unavailability of thermal energy for conversion into causal action or work and intrinsic directionality in orientable time, i.e., the asymmetric or irreversible, intrinsic arrow of time in an open, non-equilibrium system—i.e., the intrinsic directionality of natural creativity. Similar points have been made by Ilya Prigogine (Prigogine, 1997) and Lee Smolin (Smolin, 2013). As they point out, it literally makes all the difference in the world whether an extrinsic, symmetric or reversible pseudo-arrow of time (which I’ll call unreal or mechanical time) is fixed by entropy alone in in a closed, equilibrium system, or, on the contrary, an intrinsic, asymmetric or irreversible echt-arrow of time (which I’ll call real or organic time) is fixed by the intrinsic directionality of natural creativity in an open, non-equilibrium system.
In turn, insofar as The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal natural law, then the natural universe falls under the thesis of universal natural mechanism, which says that all the causal powers of everything whatsoever in the natural universe are ultimately fixed by what can be digitally computed on a universal deterministic or indeterministic real-world Turing machine, provided that the following three plausible “causal orderliness” and “decompositionality” assumptions are all satisfied:
(i) its causal powers are necessarily determined by the universal deterministic or indeterministic causal natural laws, especially including The Conservation Laws, including The 1st Law of Thermodynamics, and also The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, together with all the settled quantity-of-matter-and/or-energy facts about the past, especially including The Big Bang,
(ii) the causal powers of the real-world Turing machine are held fixed under the general causal laws of nature, and
(iii) the “digits” over which the real-world Turing machine computes constitute a complete denumerable set of spatiotemporally discrete physical objects.
But as Erwin Schrödinger pointed out in What is Life? (Schrödinger, 1944), the fact or phenomenon of organismic life presents us with an apparent paradox, since organismic life is negentropic, which apparently contradicts The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, if we hold, as per the thesis of universal natural mechanism, that the natural universe is a closed, equilibrium system, and also that in the natural universe, entropy is never negated or reversed, but only ever stays the same or increases (although it’s possible to reduce the rate of its increase), i.e., that The 2nd Law is a universal natural law.
Nevertheless, there’s a way out of this apparent paradox, if we distinguish between two different senses of “the natural universe”:
(i) the natural universe as a whole, necessarily including all its proper parts, and
(ii) the natural universe as a whole, but not necessarily including all its proper parts.
Then it’s possible to hold that the natural universe as a whole is a closed, equilibrium system and that in the natural universe as a whole, entropy never decreases, but only ever stays the same or increases (although it’s possible to reduce the rate of its increase), i.e., that The 2nd Law is a universal natural law, even though some of its proper parts—i.e., living organisms—are negentropic. In order to hold this, however, as Schrödinger also points out, some special causal laws have to be assumed to hold and some special causal powers have to be assumed to operate, under special contextual conditions, and these special causal laws, special causal powers, and special contextual conditions also have to be such that they also guarantee that ultimately, the negentropy of organisms is balanced out by corresponding proportional increases in entropy elsewhere in the natural universe as a whole—which is sometimes called “free energy minimization.” In short, under “free energy minimization,” these cosmological specialty items must also guarantee that ultimately, there’s no such thing as a thermal-energy “free lunch” in the natural universe as a whole, and that sooner or later, somewhere, somehow, living organisms must pay the thermal-energy price for their prima facie “unlawful activity,” or “crime,” of emerging and existing in it while being negentropic.[i]
It’s true that this theoretical gambit avoids the apparent paradox, but it also raises the further serious worry:
if it’s true that that the natural universe as a whole is a closed, equilibrium system and that in the natural universe as a whole, entropy never decreases, but only ever stays the same or increases (althugh it’s possible to reduce the rate of its increase), even though some of its proper parts—for example, living organisms—are negentropic, then how did these negentropic proper parts ever come to be in the first place, that is, what could ever sufficiently explain the emergence and existence of the special causal laws, special causal powers, and special contextual conditions under which organismic life—including of course, human animal life—also emerges and exists?
This worry is serious enough; but the same worry can also be converted into a mega-serious worry if one also holds, as Schrödinger does, that
[c]onsciousness finds itself intimately connected with, and dependent on, the physical state of a limited region of matter, the body. (Schrödinger, 1944: p. 94)
For
if it’s true that that the natural universe as a whole is a closed, equilibrium system and that in the natural universe as a whole, entropy never decreases, but only ever stays the same or increases (although it’s possible to reduce the rate of its increase), even though some of its proper parts—for example, living organisms—are negentropic, then how did these negentropic parts ever come to be in the first place, that is, what could ever sufficiently explain the emergence and existence of the special causal laws, special causal powers, and special contextual conditions under which NOT ONLY organismic life in general, BUT ALSO conscious, intentional, free-willed organismic life in particular—including, of course, rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed human animal life—emerges and exists?
Interestingly, Schrödinger himself proposes a new set of special causal laws, special causal powers, and special contextual conditions under which organismic life emerges and exists, consistently with the theses that the natural universe as whole is a closed, equilibrium system and that The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal law of nature. But at the same time, Schrödinger also holds that conscious, intentional, free-willed mind is a primitive, singular, non-physical fact that obtains throughout the natural universe, and is as basic as physical matter or energy—in other words, he proposes a version of panpsychism. Or in other words, for Schrödinger, organismic life is a big explanatory mystery, and rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed human animal life is a mega-big explanatory mystery (see also Schrödinger, 1956). Let’s call this Schrödinger’s two-part explanatory hard problem.
But actually, this two-part explanatory hard problem isn’t only Schrödinger’s problem. Anyone who has followed, even if only from afar, the basic literature in mainstream professional academic physics, biology, and philosophy of mind for the last seventy years, knows thatSchrödinger’s two-part explanatory hard problem is virtually everyone’s two-part explanatory hard problem, with no real progress whatsoever ever having been made. To be sure, there have been various non-trivial scientific and philosophical technical improvements in precisely how the hard problems can be formulated, and there have been literally scads of technically ingenious yet inevitably failed attempts at solving them within the framework of the Standard Models of cosmology and particle physics, and more specifically under the assumption that the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal law of nature, including 20th century versions of classical Cartesian ontological dualism, non-classical 20th century property dualism, reductive materialism or physicalism, eliminative materialism or physicalism, non-reductive materialism or physicalism, and panpsychism; but basically, they never have, and they never will, get any further than Schrödinger did (see, e.g., Chalmers, 1996, 2002; Kim, 2005).
Now, in the face of these two explanatory mysteries—the big mystery of organismic life and the mega-big mystery of rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed human animal life—and in view of the apparent impossibility of real progress in mainstream professional academic physics, biology, and philosophy of mind, within the framework of the Standard Models of cosmology and particle physics, and more specifically under the assumption that the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal law of nature, then my six-part critical-speculative proposal (see also Hanna, 2018: esp. chs. 2-3, 2022b: esp. ch. 4 and appendices 1-6) is this:
first, we deny that the natural universe as whole is a closed, equilibrium system,
second, we also deny that The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal natural law,
third, we assert that the natural universe as a whole is an open, non-equilibrium system—in the specific six-part sense that it’s
(i) denumerably infinite and non-denumerably infinite—more specifically, it has the cardinality of the natural numbers and also the cardinality of the real numbers, as well as the other basic formal properties of the classical mathematical continuum as per Cantor’s Continuum Hypothesis (Hanna, 2022b: appendices 2-4),
(ii) inherently spatial, topological, and dynamic—more specifically, it’s a spontaneously deforming, orientable, and unbounded manifestly real “cosmic rubber sheet” (Hanna, 2022b: appendix 6),
(iii) inherently temporally asymmetrically open-ended, in the intrinsic direction of the future, i.e., the intrinsic directionality of natural creativity,
(iv) such that things are always coming in and going out across the permeable membranes of any and all proper parts of the natural universe as a whole that are also open systems,
(v) such that complementarity, entanglement, and nonlocality pervade the manifestly real natural universe at all scales (Hanna, 2022b: appendix 5),
(vi) such that there’s no upper-bound on the number or kinds of things that can be done or happen in any and all proper parts of the natural universe as a whole that are also open systems, under the constraints of the Conservation Laws, especially including The First Law of Thermodynamics, i.e., that there’s a fixed totality of matter and/or energy in the natural universe, with none ever newly created or destroyed,
fourth, we assert that rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed, essentially embodied human mind, and organismic life, as irreducible natural facts or phenomena, are metaphysically continuous:
[l]ife and mind have a common abstract pattern or set of basic organizational properties. The . . . properties characteristic of mind are an enriched version of the . . . properties that are fundamental to life in general. Mind is literally life-like. (Godfrey-Smith, 1996: p. 320; Thompson, 2007; Hanna and Maiese, 2009),
fifth, we assert that the natural universe as a whole, especially including organismic life in general and rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed human animal life in particular, is negentropic, uncomputable, and naturally creative, and finally,
sixth, we also assert that all closed, equilibrium, entropic, computable, naturally mechanical systems, incorporating the pseudo-arrow of unreal or mechanical time, for which The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a special natural law, are nothing but degenerate cases, fragments, or limiting cases of—hence, systematic abstractions from—open, non-equilibrium, negentropic, uncomputable, naturally creative systems, incorporating the echt-arrow of real or organic time.
As regards the sixth part, there could be several formally different but nomologically equivalent methods for carrying out these systematic abstractions. For example, it’s arguable that the theory of quantum decoherence—i.e., the theory of quantum systems in which the wave-particle complementarity or duality, the entanglement of particles, and/or the nonlocality of wave/particle causation, are all systematically suppressed (see, e.g., Bacciagaluppi, 2020)—is one such method.
To summarize: I’m critically-speculatively proposing that the natural universe as a whole, including the metaphysical continuity of mind and life, is an open, non-equilibrium, negentropic, uncomputable system, incorporating the echt-arrow of real or organic time—in the specific six-part sense described in the immediately-preceding long paragraph—that causally operates according to natural creativity, for which The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics does not hold, and also proposing that all closed, equilibrium, entropic, computable systems, incorporating the pseudo-arrow of unreal or mechanical time, which causally operate according to natural mechanism, for which The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics does indeed hold, but only as a special natural law, are nothing but degenerate cases, fragments, or limiting cases of—hence, systematic abstractions from—open, non-equilibrium, negentropic, uncomputable, naturally creative systems.
If my six-part critical-speculative proposal were indeed true, then it would competely avoid the big and mega-big explanatory mysteries of the emergence and existence of organismic life and rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, freely-willed human life, by explanatorily inverting natural creativity and natural mechanism, and by systematically embedding all closed and equilibrium, entropic and computable, naturally mechanical systems inside the comprehensively open and non-equilibrium, negentropic and uncomputable, naturally creative natural universe, for which The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is only a special natural law, instead of arbitrarily cramming all open and non-equilibrium, negentropic and uncomputable, naturally creative systems into the comprehensively closed and equilibrium, entropic and computable, naturally-mechanical natural universe, under the assumption that The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal natural law.
Of course, this would mean revolutionizing the Standard Models of cosmology and particle physics, and also revolutionizing contemporary mainstream professional academic biology and philosophy of mind: but so what? For all sorts of reasons, it’s high time that they were all revolutionized anyhow (Hanna, 2022c).
So, in view of the fact that, following on from Schrödinger, but never getting any further than he did, virtually every theory in physics, biology, and philosophy about the emergence and existence of organismic life and rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, freely-willed human life that has been developed over the last seventy years, all of which assume that The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is a universal law of nature, inevitably encounters Schrödinger’s two-part explanatory hard problem—the big mystery of organismic life and the mega-big mystery of rational, conscious, intentional, self-conscious, free-willed human life—whereas my six-part critical speculative proposal has neither of these explanatory mysteries, and indeed has no explanatory mysteries whatsoever, I conclude that my six-part proposal, especially including the thesis that The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is only a special law of nature, and not a universal law, is explanatorily superior to all those other theories, no matter how good in other theoretical respects they happen to be, and therefore should be accepted, by inference-to-the-best-explanation.
NOTE
[i] Doesn’t this strangely remind you of the coercive authoritarianism of technocratic mega-capitalist neoliberal nation-States like the USA, and of the prima facie “crimes” of existing in it while being homeless or nomadic, jobless or unemployed, and/or poor, especially if you’re also non-white? In my opinion, this analogy or parallelism is not a mere coincidence, but that’s another story for another day.
REFERENCES
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