<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>It is often argued both by scientists and the lay public that it is extremely unlikely for life or minds to arise spontaneously, but this argument is hard to quantify. In this paper I make this argument more rigorous, starting with a review of the concepts of information and entropy, and then examining the specific case of Maxwell's demon and how it relates to living systems. I argue that information and entropy are objective physical quantities, defined for systems as a whole, which allow general arguments in terms of physical law. In particular, I argue that living systems obey the same rules as Maxwell's demons.</p>
</abstract>

It is often argued both by scientists and the lay public that it is extremely unlikely for life or minds to arise spontaneously, but this argument is hard to quantify. In this paper I make this argument more rigorous, starting with a review of the concepts of information and entropy, and then examining the specific case of Maxwell's demon and how it relates to living systems. I argue that information and entropy are objective physical quantities, defined for systems as a whole, which allow general arguments in terms of physical law. In particular, I argue that living systems obey the same rules as Maxwell's demons.

Spontaneous Appearance of Life and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

BioCosmos: New perspectives on the origin and evolution of life

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

{"article-title":"Spontaneous Appearance of Life and the Second Law of Thermodynamics"}

It is often argued both by scientists and the lay public that it is extremely unlikely for life or minds to arise spontaneously, but this argument is hard to...

Spontaneous Appearance of Life and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

Article Category: Physics and Cosmology

Published Online: Apr 13, 2022

Page range: 1 - 11

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/biocosmos-2022-0006

© 2022 David W. Snoke, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.