Apr 14, 2012 -- 5:00AM, Lilwabbit wrote:

Your repetitive evasion is fundamental to this debate as it shows (1) you're not able to demonstrate entropy as a property of energy and therefore (2) you're not able to demonstrate the falsity of regarding entropy as caused by an objective law, namely the second law of thermodynamics. 

Hey, that's ok, because we're not concerned about entropy.  We are concerned about why you think G caused E.  We know E exists and behaves a certain way.  We don't know that E had to be caused to exist, nor if a G exists that can be said to be E's cause.  If you can, then we can move forward.  Since you are asking others to demonstrate the truthfulness of their positions it is only fair that you provide actual demonstrations in reality.  Can you show us that E had to be caused/created?  Can you show us a G exists?  If you can't you can answer "I don't know" as well.

Apr 14, 2012 -- 11:05AM, JCarlin wrote:

Apr 14, 2012 -- 2:53AM, Lilwabbit wrote:

It qualifies as a faith-based claim. A scientific explanation would require you to explain what are the properties in energy which make energy transfer towards lower energy states.

My "faith" is in Gibbs free energy and the mathematical functionality of differential equations.  I have studied enough Chemistry and math to be able to understand the working of Gibbs free energy in chemical reactions, and can follow if not reproduce de novo the mathematical expressions of its existence.  College level advanced Physical Chemistry and a college level course in differential equations is basic to this "faith."  Show your openers and we can discuss this offline. 

Let's have them. Show me how the uniform directionality of energy-dispersal is a property of energy? That was your claim, not mine. Nor that of most physicists. You should have studied more physics rather than chemistry. Have you ever heard of chemistry jokes by physicists?

Apr 14, 2012 -- 11:48AM, Lilwabbit wrote:

Wrong. They make universal claims of how things behave even though no universal observations exist.

You apparently didn't get the memo that in mainstream science today, the possibility that what we call "laws" are only local and not universal is taken very seriously. Certainly more seriously than this virtually unknown and utterly ineffectual "proof" you spend so much time desperately defending.

Lilwabbit -

The law of entropy is based in probability theory.  The reason systems tend toward equilibrium is because the number of states that can be classified as disordered vastly exceed the number of states that can be classified as ordered.  So, as a system evolves through phase space, the probability of moving from a region of order to a region of disorder is exceptionally high.

I'm gone for a second and the raucous rout gets characteristically raucous.

Apr 14, 2012 -- 12:34PM, Blü wrote:

Lilwabbit

Your silence on how you conclude anything needs a cause is even more eloquent than my large purple post.

I've asked you repeatedly to show me how the uniform directionality of energy-dispersal is a property of energy. What is it within energy that makes energy transfer from higher to lower states when no additional energy is flowing into the system? A scientifically grounded answer would explain energy as the cause of entropy and would free us of any need to appeal to universal laws governing energy. It would also move us a step closer to explaining how energy contains a sufficient reason for its own existence (i.e. E would be "self-caused" in Hatcherian terms and not "other-caused" as he suggests). However, in the consistent absence of scientifically grounded answers to my questions, I am concluding you're evading them, and that you are unable to defend the position of energy's self-causation. As a result, you would like to ignore the topic altogether and move on to the third option: that energy exists without any cause whatsoever.

I was kind of hoping you would, because this is the least tenable of all the three options (E being other-caused, E being self-caused, E being not caused). It stumbles upon the classical problem of insufficient reason. The philosophical formulation of PIR (Principle of Insufficient Reason) is as follows:

"The principle that if there is no sufficient reason for something's being, then it will not exist. It is a significant principle in Western philosophy and science."

- The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy (Robert Audi, general editor), Cambridge University Press 1996

The PIR is closely related to the classical problem of ex nihilo nihil fit (nothing comes from nothing) and it is logically equivalent to the PSR (Principle of Sufficient Reason).

Now you and some of your choir boys here have made the radical claim that energy exists without any cause whatsoever, not even within itself (inherent properties). If such a claim is advanced in all scientific seriousness (there's a first time for everything), it would follow the insurmountable challenge of demonstrating how energy is able to exist without any internal or external reason for it to exist. However, if you are once more to appeal to the inherent capacity of energy to exist independently, then you're no longer advancing the claim that E exists without any cause. Rather, you would be rephrasing the earlier claim that energy contains within itself a sufficient reason for its own existence. But as demonstrated, when I repeatedly pressed for details as to the nature of such inherent properties, you refused to answer and hence we're here. So what will it be? Do you have any original position on the matter or are you simply switching between options at personal convenience, as long as it doesn't reek of a god?

Now, I answered your question straight on as I promised. Please demonstrate the untenability of the PIR. It's your turn. Do not start another round of cat-and-mouse with me. If you fail to offer an alternative to the PIR which is more reasonable and not more absurd than the PIR, then you can indeed claim to be more reasonable and scientific than those who accept there must always be a reason for something to exist. If you can't, then those who accept the PIR and the PSR are only being more reasonable and scientific than you and your friends.

Kind regards,

LilWabbit