Post date: Jun 13, 2011 2:23:43 AM
Entropy is the name for the process that causes things to get more chaotic over time. Ironically, an increase in chaos is measured by how uniformly matter and energy are distributed in a system. A system with perfect entropy will be completely homogenous throughout; every part looks and acts just like every other part.
Life is the opposite of entropy. By definition, living things have a metabolism, maintain themselves, grow, respond to stimuli, reproduce, and adapt to their environments. Living things organize the raw materials of their environment to sustain themselves and reproduce.
Life and entropy work against each other. Entropy makes a room messy and life does spring cleaning. Life builds the pyramids of Giza and entropy returns those pyramids to the desert sands. Life gives matter sentience and entropy is the work of worms on cold dead flesh.
Are life and entropy complete opposites?
Imagine what humanity might be like in a billion billion years. Imagine the work of a trillion generations. Perhaps every planet in every solar system in the Milky Way galaxy would be a replica of Earth, a perfect 1.0 gravity well on which children are raised to be the next generation of seeds to start new Earths. Perhaps the dust between the stars will be collected to make food the same way we collect fish from the sea today. Maybe the stars themselves will be maintained like a large appliance in homes of today.
Life begets life and the process continues until every resource is added to the cycle of life.
Is fire alive or merely a conspirator of entropy? A wildfire has a metabolism, maintains itself, grows, responds to stimuli, reproduces, and adapts to its environment. It seems to be alive. On the other hand, fire seems to be an agent of entropy when it changes a varied lush forest into a uniform charred ash.
Said that way, though, life sounds like entropy. Given trillions of trillions of years the entire universe will have time to expand, cool, and mix itself chaotically until every single part looks just like every other part. Given those same trillions of years, sentient life from Earth could have the same effect on the universe.
Is entropy alive?