The second law of thermodynamics is as close to an absolute law that we have in the physical universe. This law states that the entropy (disorder) in an isolated system will always increase rather than decrease. Over time, this isolated system will become more and more disordered, and energy will become more and more evenly distributed until such time as the isolated system reaches a completely constant state of temperature and disorder.
To put in perspective just how absolute this law is, there is a quote by Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington that seems instructive. "The law that entropy always increases holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature. If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell's equations — then so much the worse for Maxwell's equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation — well, these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation."
So what is an isolated system? It is anything beyond which matter and energy cannot pass. Where this get interesting, of course, is when you recognize that everything ultimately is an isolated system. Look at our universe. Can matter and energy pass beyond our universe's borders? Not according to any scientific principle we know. What caused the organization of matter and the high energy state of the Big Bang? Again, nothing that we know from science.
But this isn't arguing God in the gaps -- it is something more important than that. Whatever caused the Big Bang, and whatever caused that, and so forth backwards through an infinite duration, eventually we define the system large enough whereby everything that ever was and is becomes our isolated system. Whether that is the Branes of Stephen Hawking, or something different, ultimately isolation is the end result of our digging.
What does that mean for the second law of thermodynamics -- the law that always holds, and any theory in opposition to it is destined to collapse in deepest humiliation? What it means is that you have an isolated system that has been operating for an infinite period of time. Because entropy will have been increasing, but for something upon which entropy does not apply this universe should have been form and void and at a constant background temperature. This world that we live in and the universe in which we live could not exist according to the second law of thermodynamics if cause and effect happen the way we currently envision them happening.
We are left with only one option. Someone or something must not be bound by the second law of thermodynamics. Someone or something must not increase in disorder over time, but rather roll forth in order and increase in energy over time. The Someone sounds a lot like God, and the something sounds a great deal like Heaven. But for this Someone or Something, nothing could exist except as background radiation. Our understanding of the scriptures and the doctrine, however, gives us the a better understanding and ability to see the truth that science is prepared to reveal to us.
One thing that repeatedly shocks me as I examine the scientism behind atheism is the continually self-refuting philosophies of those who seek to piggyback science into supporting a view of the universe that is simply impossible. It is so often a result (atheism) in search of evidence.
No comments:
Post a Comment