Laws of thermodynamics?
Dear Tom, I have been trying to put the purpose of the Universe in context with these two most fundamental principles.
Starting with the second law of thermodynamics I must refer to page 8 of your book where you say that neither house nor a life builds itself because it needs a thoughtful design. The thing that seems to be missing here is the fact that a house STILL wont get built itself even with a design UNLESS there is an energy input into the system. This is because if a house was to built itself spontaneously it would create more order in the Universe which, if being the ONLY result, is energetically impossible. A creation of order within a system is indeed possible ONLY if it is compensated by even greater disorder in the surroundings ie. the rest of the universe.
Daniel
Laws of "thermodynamics" represent a very narrow (purely materialistic) point of view, that completely ignores the Intellect, Intelligence and all Conscious processes - including exchange of information in the Universe and development of Intellect.
Adopting your limited logic - the Universe could NEVER come to existence from Singular Nothing, simply because any beginning of "order" would disinterate into chaos, before any better "order" could occur. Not even a single atom (an example of highly ordered structure) would be possible.
This is in VIVID contrast with observable Reality of the Universe. There is a PHENOMENAL ORDER everywhere we look. What is the ORIGIN of this order? What is its PURPOSE?
In summary, laws of thermodynamics represent only 2 letters of the "alphabet" of the Universal Law. Can you read a book if you insist on recognizing and acknowledging only 2 letters of the alphabet?
In particular, laws ot thermodynamics are NOT capable of explaining development of your Intellect (the ability to develop ITSELF in the direction of INTENT, ability to LEARN, ability to COMMUNICATE, ability to MAKE CHOICES, ability to ADAPT etc...). You seem to focus on "hardware" (that disintegrates - becomes obsolete - anyway) and totally ignore the "software" that CAN actually evolve and preserve itself indefinitely.
As for the house, it actually CAN build itself, if the Designer is intelligent enough. It wouldn't be made of bricks and plaster though - such materials are result of our ignorance and complete lack of imagination. Have you heard of "dokos" (force field buildings) described in The Book?
It can be proven that intelligent Life (the eco-system) actually reduces entropy (an act against your 2-nd law of thermodynamics). From simple inorganic compounds (disorder) - extremely well organized and "ordered" organisms are created CELL BY CELL - not from "energy" but by INTELLIGENT and conscious ADAPTATION to existing conditions. They do NOT create "chaos" - they create HARMONY.
Even if you had UNLIMITED amount of "energy" and all "elements" to your disposal, you still wouldn't be able to make even a single seed that would grow to a plant that would produce more seeds, resist diseases, grow missing parts, interact with other plants and Life etc... What you miss is NOT an "energy" - you simply do not have enough Knowledge and INTELLIGENCE to design Life.
Tom
Text book physics says that the entropy of the Universe always increases. So WHY - when scaling back in time to the big bang, the entropy of the Universe decreased as some experts 'agreed' at http://image.gsfc.nasa.gov/poetry/ask/a11618.html ? Something wrong with the second law of thermodynamics if the existence of The Intellect is ignored.
KL
The 2-nd law doesn't describe all aspects of the Reality of the Universe. Have you noticed that nearly every conclusion about the Universe (including the one you just mentioned) is based on a complete lack of understanding of gravity?
Tom
