The Laws of Thermodynamics

Posted by Worldview Warriors On Friday, March 7, 2014 3 comments

The First Law of Thermodynamics states that matter or energy cannot be created or destroyed in a closed system.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that there will always be a general tendency from order to disorder in a closed system.

What is this talking about and how is this relevant? Both of these laws scream in the face of the naturalistic account of Evolution. How do we make sense of it all? Let us dig a little deeper here. With the First Law, we cannot suddenly have new matter or loss of matter, nor can we have new energy or loss of energy. It all has to go somewhere. Yes, the sun heats the earth, but we notice the earth is not continually getting warmer and warmer. It cools down at night. The energy the sun provides has to either be converted into useful energy, which plants do well, or it has to escape the earth. This makes the sun part of the system.

Evolutionists will often say that because of the First Law that there could be no creation. But wait? If God could not create because of the First Law, how could matter and energy get there in the first place? Some will go as far as saying that matter and energy are eternal because of the First Law. That is not what Scripture says. Scripture is clear that God created everything from nothing except his voice. Many references point this out like Genesis 1:1, Hebrews 11:3, and John 1:3. The Creation was a miracle. It cannot be explained by science. Science can show what pieces God used to put the universe together and how they are used. But it cannot explain how the pieces got there. We have to take that by faith, as Christians or as Evolutionists. We can only know that God created the universe because God has revealed it to us. He told us he did it. It’s not what science says either. The Second Law demonstrates there had to be a beginning of the universe.

The Second Law also provides a lot of havoc for the Evolutionist position. Why? Because every observation we have of our world shows a trend for order to disorder. From organization to chaos. I have seen many times where a believer in Evolution will try to save their position by describing how the earth is not a closed system and that adding energy is the answer to it all. However, this does not help them when you really think about it. It actually makes it a whole lot worse. Energy is always destructive. Always, unless you have a well-designed, purposeful mechanism that can control and direct that energy. Let me illustrate.

We added a lot of energy to Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Did anything organized or beneficial come out of that energy? In 2005, Hurricane Katrina added a lot of energy to New Orleans and the area. Anything organized come out of that? Energy always is destructive unless there is a mechanism to guide and direct it. Chlorophyll is an amazing machine in plants that converts sunlight energy into plant food and oxygen for us. The parts of chlorophyll are so intricate and complex that the most advanced factories and plants we have today still cannot compare. And we cannot see chlorophyll with our naked eyes. We need a microscope to see it.

Now here is the kicker. No matter what mechanism we have, there is not one that is 100% efficient. Not one that can take every bit of energy provided and use it completely for something beneficial. There is always a loss of energy due to heat or other waste in every energy exchange. Remember, 100% efficient just breaks even. For Evolution to be true, each mechanism would need to be greater than 100% efficient because they predict a gain of function that was not there before. And before life began, there were no such mechanisms in nature because life did not exist yet. Every mechanism is less than 100% efficient and so it is all going towards decay and destruction. This is also evidence that there was once a perfect state of the universe. Because we are going from order to disorder, and we still have order today, that means that there had to be up to perfect order in the past.

Evolution is impossible because of this realization. The Natural Sciences do not reflect what is expected for Evolution to be true. In fact they can only make sense in light of Biblical Creation. Why is that? That will have to wait for another post. In all my studies on this issue, I am running out of natural laws that God instilled during the Creation Week that Evolution and its natural consequences do not violate. But they are in perfect alignment with the Biblical Worldview that we need to adhere to.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you want to understand how matter comes from "nothing", I suggest you read Laurence Krauss's excellent book "A Universe From Nothing." Second, since you're an expert on thermo, how many laws of thermodynamics are there, and how are they numbered? Also, your Hiroshima bomb analogy is a false analogy. Sure, there was a lot of energy, but there was also a lot of power. Do you know the difference between energy and power, and how they're related? I suspect not, because if you did, you wouldn't have used the analogy that you did. Happy Googling!

Charlie said...

Anonymous, I don't need Google. I'm certified to teach Physics and I can tell you that both you and Krauss do not know what you are talking about. Yeah, you can Google, but can you find truth from Google? Or from Krauss? Krauss does a fine job at equivocation in his book. He defines "nothing" in one way, then without changing contexts, he defines it in another way. Krauss effectively says "Nothing really means nothing, but the universe was not really nothing when it started." Krauss is a big talker, nothing else.

Yes, I do know the relationship between energy and power. Do you know the difference between free energy and useful energy? Please, by all means Google away and show me any means of energy being used in anyway that is none destructive WITHOUT using an intelligently designed mechanism in place to direct and use that energy. And please, by all means show me an 100% efficient machine.

Enjoy your Googling. I'll be sticking with actual scientific facts.

Anonymous said...

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