[SinJin]

This was briefly mentioned on another thread, but I was hoping to get maybe some more in depth opinions to the theory that the distinction between what is "good" and "bad" is directly related to the arrow of entropy.



Here is the theory: Entropy in the universe rises, which means that the amount of disorder rises. The universe started in a highly ordered state and is slowly moving to a more and more disordered state. This flow of entropy, or disorder, shining through the incredibly detailed facets of our lives and consciousness in turn appears in the form of good and bad. For example, if you kill someone it is bad because you have taken a life, might go to jail, caused pain and suffering from the victim's family, etc. But stepping a bit farther back, what has that murder really done? It's interrupted the victim's life, a life inputting energy (food, water, sunlight) and outputting work (running a business, working at a gas station, etc.) The work that person did was helping to add order to life and society. But because you killed them, they will now be buried, eventually decompose, and their atoms that once made up their body will become disordered along with the rest of the universe. And that's just the victim! Then you have the victim's family experiencing grief, you going to jail, and so on, which all adds up to a great loss in productivity from everyone involved. A great loss in the ability to produce order.



The can step back even further and relate the same thing to a star. A star slowly burns fuel, releasing heat into space, which raises the disorder. However it does it slowly. If a star were to suddenly collapse into a blackhole, it would be bad for us (if it was our star, the sun) because it would deprive us of sunlight, warmth, and would ultimately destroy Earth. That would be "bad." Relating this to entropy, a star that collapses into a blackhole is bad because the amount of disorder increased dramatically. However, if the star remains stable, then it is "good," because it's rise of disorder is slowed down. Of course humans can only apply the words good and bad to this example. To the universe it would be considered slow rise in disorder and fast rise in disorder. The star burning fuel is a machine the universe created the slow entropy's rise, just as humans do the same thing. Only humans are so much more complex than a star that we have a thousand variations on that slow rise or fast rise of disorder.



I think this theory includes the idea that if the universe is trying to slow down the rise in entropy, then perhaps through life, evolution and technology it's goal is to eventually reverse the arrow and lower entropy.



I would like to know if anyone has any additions, corrections, or comments here. I am tempted to say that every example of good or bad can be related to a slow increase or fast increase in disorder respectively, and would like to know if there any that do not display this.

[Mr. Nobody]

Wonderful idea. Lets examine it in more detail. If life is the struggle against entropy, then we emerged from an environment that exhibits a slow slide towards disorder. The universe evolved, maybe through many cycles of inflation/big bangs, to produce black holes. Based on latest research, black holes are not permanent either and tend to evaporate so that the end product is perhaps spatial singularities or plain nothing. Either way it should be a state of maximum entropy. From BB to SS, what drives the universe? What motivates the cosmos to expand, to have gone through transformations. Is it to produce SS's as quickly as possible? Is the ultimate evolution, the reason of it all to produce environments that are conducive to form spatial singularities? Is the overriding urge of the cosmos to end up in maximum entropy as quickly as possibly? If the answer is yes, then life, the emergence of autonomy out of a system, the great organizer is an anomaly.
Another point to ponder: If life's purpose is to organize, to produce order out of disorder, then why are we autonomic, why are we conscious, why does our intelligence appear to be the crown of biological evolution? Would it not be more efficient to create a society based on group emergence, an ant colony, where there is no sentience, but only the path of construction, efficient and without the inevitable disorder of individualities.

Nice topic

[SinJin]

Originally Posted by Mr. Nobody What motivates the cosmos to expand, to have gone through transformations. Is it to produce SS's as quickly as possible? Is the ultimate evolution, the reason of it all to produce environments that are conducive to form spatial singularities? Is the overriding urge of the cosmos to end up in maximum entropy as quickly as possibly?

I believe this is one possibility. Like you said, if this were true, then life would be an anomoly, perhaps even a burden to the universe's goal, as life seems to slow entropy. The other possibility is that the overriding urge of the cosmos is to end in maximum entropy as slowly as possible, or possibly even reverse it, then life is no longer an anomoly but part of the cosmos' evolution.

If life is not an anomoly, I think we can look at it this way: Life is part of the cosmos' evolution. Throughout that evolution the universe tries countless combinations and possibilities to further slow down entropy. Humans are one of those possibilities. Perhaps non-sentient robots who can break down matter on a subatomic level and reconstruct it are another possibility - but we don't know about them because they are either too far away from us, or perhaps they evolved right next to a star that went supernova. I'm not saying that the universe itself and the force that dictates that it either obtains maximum entropy quickly or slowly is something conscious and can make decisions on what and how life develops to achieve this task. Rather I think it is tied in with the TOE. The same equation that combines the four fundemental forces also includes this driving force that tries to slow entropy's rise. Life, in many shapes and forms, is the product of this. But I think as to why sentient, indivudual life such as humans became the dominent species on Earth is a seperate question. Looking at the entire universe, you are probably right in saying that the best candidate for slowing down entropy as much as possible is probably some sort of non-sentient life that can work in conjunction with eachother. Perhaps the universe will eventually get it right, or already has somewhere far, far away!

[Guille]

Sinjin,

I believe that there is a big relationship between disorder and probability. What do you think?

By the way, I always wondered, is there any proof that the entropy, i.e. disorder, of the universe is growing? how? (I don't ask why, because why is a philosophical question).

[Mr. Nobody]

Looking at the entire universe, you are probably right in saying that the best candidate for slowing down entropy as much as possible is probably some sort of non-sentient life that can work in conjunction with eachother. Perhaps the universe will eventually get it right, or already has somewhere far, far away!

Perhaps we can call communities of living matter the culmination of evolution, society as an emergent organism, more than the sum of its part. In this association of many, humans act and obey as the cells of a new entity. Competition of cultures, politics and wars all serve to battle for dominance within nature. The highest order of matter is the group dynamics of individual creatures that form a society, evolution at its finest, once again

[SinJin]

Originally Posted by Mr. Nobody Perhaps we can call communities of living matter the culmination of evolution, society as an emergent organism, more than the sum of its part. In this association of many, humans act and obey as the cells of a new entity. Competition of cultures, politics and wars all serve to battle for dominance within nature. The highest order of matter is the group dynamics of individual creatures that form a society, evolution at its finest, once again

I agree with you there, although I'm not sure I'd say the highest order of matter is those that form society. Surely that is the stage we're at, but there might be another, even more ordely stage out there we have yet to reach. However, it does seem that at each stage, the decrease in entropy that life enables gets more intense. A single celled organism is ordered, but a fish is even more ordered, and effecient at slowing down entropy. A human is even more ordered, able to live longer and use resources more precisely. Plus a human can think of new ideas and ways to slow entropy even further (for instance, inventing the bicycle). But then when a society comes about, you have the combined manpower and intelligence to come up with ways to slow entropy even further, more so than an individual can. So at each step we have an increase in slowing down the rise of entropy. I wonder if there is any pattern, like if the increase is exponential, or if there's even a way to measure it. But I do think there are stages in which this slowing down of entropy occure - first it's through the biology of life, then through society, and then through technology.