The 2nd law of statistical thermodynamics states that in a closed system any natural transformation goes towards the more probable states. The states of organization are those more improbable, then transformations spontaneously go towards non-organization, so to speak. Since evolution would be spontaneous organization, evolution disagrees with the 2nd law.
The tendency expressed in the 2nd law rules all physical phenomena and is clearly evident in our everyday life, where e.g. systems that were ok yesterday, today are ko, while systems that are ko, do not self repair and remain ko until an intelligent intervention. In short, things break down and do not self-repair, to greater reason they do not self-organize. All that can be related to the trend of the 2nd law.
Before this evidence an usual objection is that Earth is not a closed system because it receives radiant energy from the Sun, so the 2nd law doesn’t apply. Such energy — evolutionists say — would provide the organizing power for evolution. Here we will see in very simple terms as this is nothing but a naive illusion.
In my previous post I noted how, according to general systems theory, organization shows always two different aspects: power and control. Energy is related to the power that the system needs to work and control is related to all what pertains to the “intelligence” of the system, what governs both energy/matter and information in the system. Notice that control has even to organize the energy itself powering the system. If energy really had the organizing capability evolutionists believe, one would ask why systems theory does such distinction in the first place. (In philosophical terms, in a sense, the above distinction is related to the distinction between action and knowledge. Action without knowledge is only agitation and disorder. We will see below how power/energy without control is even destructive.)
All know what energy is. The capability to do a work. Mechanical work/energy is defined as a force producing a shift. A moving object has kinetic energy, due to its speed. Thermal energy is due to the disordered motions of the molecules making up matter. Electric energy is a flow of electrons. Chemical energy is sort of potential energy able to power chemical reactions. Radiant energy is carried by light and other electromagnetic radiation.
Energy can power the systems, but never can create the organized system in the first place. In short, energy is the fuel, not the engine. Example, in photosynthesis, used by plants to convert light energy into chemical energy, the light energy presupposes a photosynthesis system just in place. The light energy doesn’t create the photosynthesis system, like the photons don’t create the photovoltaic cell that outputs electric current.
In all definitions of “energy” there is nothing that could lead us to think that energy is able to transform improbable states into probable states. Consequently, energy cannot change the situation of the 2nd law: energy cannot create organization, which always implies highly improbable states. Indeed the opposite: per se uncontrolled energy is destructive. Example: an abandoned building is slowly but inexorably destroyed by the natural forces of the environment during some centuries. If we increases the energy by considering a flood, it can be destroyed in some days. With more energy, a tornado can destroy it in minutes. Finally with the energy of a bomb we can destroy the building in few seconds. More the energy, more the speed of destruction.
If we consider the physical principle of mass–energy equivalence we reach the same conclusion as above. Mass per se has nothing to do with real organization. Mass and matter are simply the initial support/substance on which an higher principle — intelligence/essence — must operate to obtain a final organized system.
In general we can say that what energy can do is to speed the processes/transformations. But since the transformations go towards the more probable states, uncontrolled energy, far from helping evolution, it could even worsen its problems, because accelerates the trend towards non-organization. The moral is that to invoke uncontrolled energy to revert the trend of the 2nd law is counterproductive for evolutionists.
An objection that evolutionists could rise is: energy can power and greatly speed the chemical reactions, so they can produce life. In these objection there are two problems.
(1) Usually chemical reactions go towards equilibrium, the more probable state, so they don’t overturn at all the 2nd law.
(2) In this context the alleged naturalistic origin of life stated by evolutionism is a non-sequitur. In the hierarchy of biological organization chemical reactions are at the lowest level. Between this level and the final organization of organisms there are countless layers of complexity, related to increasingly higher kinds of abstractness and formalism, which are unattainable by mere chemistry.
Another similar evolutionist objection is that in 1953 Miller and Urey conducted an experiment where some organic compounds such as amino acids were formed by providing thermal and electric energy to a mixture of methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and water. Again no new organization here. The compounds obtained are exactly the probable transformations that the system was able to produce, under the same circumstances. In fact if one repeats the Miller/Urey experiment he gets again the same results. This shows that nothing improbable happens, rather something of very probable, almost certain. No violation of the 2nd law. Obviously also here there is an abyss between the Miller/Urey amino acids and the organization of life, also if we consider a single unicellular organism.
To sum up, the 2nd law in the context of statistical thermodynamics, provides a fundamental reason why naturalistic origin of life is impossible. To resort to energy doesn’t solve the problem, because energy is not a source of organization, rather the inverse: uncontrolled energy can cause destruction (= non-organization). Only intelligence is source of organization, and as such can explain the arise of life, the more organized thing in the cosmos.