Into the Cool : Energy Flow, Thermodynamics, and Life

Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2006. Soft cover. Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. xviii 362 pages, includes references and index. The book has been covered with contact and there is an ownership signature on both the front paste down and front end paper, else a nice copy, clean, unmarked and solid. "Scientists, theologians, and philosophers have all sought to answer the questions of why we are here and where we are going. This natural basis of life has proved elusive, but in Into the Cool, Eric D. Schneider and Dorion Sagan look for answers in a surprising place: the second law of thermodynamics. This second law refers to energy's inevitable tendency to change from being concentrated in one place to becoming spread out over time. Although the second law is usually and correctly associated with molecular chaos - and thus with aging, loss, and death - Schneider and Sagan show that it is also vital to life and complexity; it is behind evolution, ecology, economics, and even life's origin. More observable than divine caprice, more real than computer simulations, and more basic than natural selection is the organizing, complexity-giving power of the second law.". "Working from the precept that "nature abhors a gradient," Into the Cool details how complex systems emerge, enlarge, and reproduce in a world tending toward disorder. From hurricanes here to life on other worlds, from human evolution to the systems humans have created, this pervasive pull toward equilibrium governs life at its molecular base and at its peak in the elaborate structures of living complex systems." (back cover)