What Is Entropy? A Measure of Just How Little We Really Know.

[NNadir]

7. The Second Law of Thermodynamics Isn't Popular Around Here.

Last edited Fri Dec 13, 2024, 06:04 PM - Edit history (1)

It's why we have so many people acting as if batteries, and worse, hydrogen are "green," when in fact, the opposite is true.

I recall one undergraduate text that remarked in the text that this question reverberates through every introductory PChem class in the the world.

For me, when it finally sunk in was when I set aside some time to embrace, from a purely historical perspective the definition via the laws of statistical mechanics of gases.

It is a beautiful thing, I think, to recognize the state of the ensemble of velocity vectors, rotational states and positions of the air molecules of every room I've ever been in is so improbable as to be impossible, and yet, as impossible as it is, it exists in every instance just so, never to be repeated.

It is awful to consider that the man who gave us this ineffably beautiful insight, Boltzman, killed himself.

Entropy is a marvelous thing to embrace. For me, it gives my life, which will soon surrender to Entropy, meaning.