Azzone, Giovanni F. “NEGENTROPY AND HISTORICAL ARROW OF TIME. THERMODYNAMICAL AND INFORMATIONAL ASPECTS OF THE DARWINIAN REVOLUTION.” What is Controlling Life 3 (1994): 38-44.
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My purpose is to use concepts taken from thermodynamics and information theory to discuss basic features of the evolution of the natural world [1]. This leads to the question as to whether the nature of life can be described by the concept of negentropy. About 60-70 years ago well known physicists pointed out that biological systems had behaviors in apparent contrast with the second law of thermodynamics. In fact, the tendency of biological systems is directed 1) not to equilibrium but rather to maintenance of steady states; and 2) to increase not of disorder but rather of complexity and of hierarchical organization during phylogenetic evolution. The answer to the steady state problem is relatively simple and given already in the forties in the famous book by Erwin Schrödinger What is life [2]. The maintenance of the steady state depends on the fact that living organisms are open systems, catalyzing a continuous exchange of matter and energy with the environment. The utilization of matter and energy provided by the environment leads to negentropic processes and development of negentropic structures, the main concern of Schrödinger in the forties. The answer to the
second problem, that of the increase of organization, is just beginning to appear
and it is much more complex.