WOW- - - i n f o r m a t i o n o v e r l o a d

DANGER Will Robinson....

I can't keep up with you natureisawesome, I don't have time to read you replies/posts. Ask a simple question, get an answer the size of a thesis.

Could you perhaps condense this thread into a scientific text and next time I'm in Waterstones I'll pick up a copy and then I can read in on the train on the way to work?

You seem keen to dismiss Prigonine's theories very quickly, I find that surprising since you seem to know a thing or two about a thing or two. I feel out of my depth. I am somewhat sceptical about your bible babble though. I hope I can get round to replying to your comments. Order and disorder are confusing and somewhat subjective concepts when it comes to thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. It's perhaps better to think of it in terms of equilibrium, non-equilibrium and quasi-equilibrium.

It's over ten years since I studied statmech and it took me some time back then to get my head round it, i've largely forgotten a lot of the microcanonical models and all that. But I am sure I still comprehend the concept of entropy, I looked up wikipedia and it seemed to agree with you on wether a closed system moves towards a state of disorder. So far as I see, a closed system, say a gas, will eventually even out into a state of equilibrium whereopon the molecules will represent a perfect Gaussian spread in term of the kinetic energy they possess. That to me seems the most ordered state a gas can be in?

Anyway, its good to have someone question theories which I have more or less accepted as valid, I hope I can convince both of us that Progigone's dissipative structures hold water.

Tot laters...