Thanks for the response. Perhaps you can help me to better understand how the second law of thermodynamics applies to evolution.
Here are two thought experiments that should demonstrate how I understand the basic principle of the law:
Scenario A (the closed system):
Imagine a box, separated by a partition directly down the center which divides it into two portions. Now one side contains particles of gas moving about at a constant velocity (for simplicity's sake) and the other is a complete vacuum. If we were to remove the partition, the particles would spread out within the entire space of the box and the entropy of both halves would reach equilibrium. If the partition were to be slid back into place, the entropy of the two halves should remain the same.
Scenario B - the open system:
Ok now think about the same box but without the center partition. Inside the box there are a small number of gas particles at low concentration and low temperature (low entropy) and outside the box there is a much higher concentration of particles at higher temperature (high entropy). In this scenario we can consider the box's surroundings to be an infinite reservoir. Remove a side of the box and the entropy within and without will reach equilibrium irreversibly just as in scenario A.
The basic problem here is that your scenario B is not really describing an open system. It is describing another, larger closed system, once you open the side of the box.
Try this modification:
Instead of letting the energy from the larger surrounding closed system into the box by simply opening its side, keep the box closed and introduce the energy through an electrical wire. The wire is attached to an ice-making machine and a fan which blows the air into the rest of the box.
Now what is happening inside the box? Energy is going into the box via the electric wire, but the effect of adding this energy is to power a refrigerating system that makes the air in the box cooler!
That is what is possible in an open system. If you have a way of capturing the incoming energy and putting it to work, you can get a decrease in entropy within the open system.
Now of course, this cannot be a permanent situation. At some point either the motor on the fan, or the ice-making machine, will break down, or the outside source of energy will be cut off. Then the box becomes a closed system again, and the increase in entropy will resume.
Similarly with earth. At some point, the sun's energy will fail, and there will no longer be a possibilty of temporary decreases in entropy on earth. But we are a long way from that happening yet.
We are in the situation where there is plenty of incoming energy and myriad ways of capturing that energy to do work. In this situation, local, though temporary decreases in entropy can be expected. (Remembering that "temporary" in this case may be measured in billions of years.)
Ok so 2LoT should then apply even to open systems right? But how is it that life can exist? Because of Maxwell's demon. Life pushes entropy out of itself, for a while and then it is consumed irreversibly.
One thing to remember in this case is that "life" does not refer to each individual's life, but to the life of an organism and all of that organism's descendants. Through reproduction, life is passed from one generation to another and keeps on going as long as reproduction keeps on going, even though each generation dies and decays.
Think of a species of black birds that becomes completely isolated in a perfect environment for its survival. Given time and chance, it may be possible that one or more birds develops a small minute change in its genetic code which alters the color of its feathers to yellow. Now, since the environment is already ideal the color yellow does not affect the bird's chance of survival one bit.
Actually, if the environment is ideal for black birds, it is probably not ideal for yellow birds, and so it would affect the bird's chance of survival. However, let that pass for the moment.
It lives and breeds at its normal rate (assuming that color has no bearing on courtship). But how does this affect the population? Well, according to the principle of irreversibility the differences of genetic information between the black birds and yellow birds should somehow move toward equilibrium, and since there is a very small population of yellow birds as compared to black birds, it should hardly make a dent.
Are you speaking of a Mendelian equilibrium here? That is what one might expect, although as Assyrian says, one must also be mindful of genetic drift which can fix neutral traits in a population, especially if it is small and isolated.
Now, let's add in Maxwell's demon by isolating the black bird population in a scorching hot desert region. Suddenly the change in feather color might be just enough to turn the tables in favor of yellow birds.
So... what's the point? Survival of the fittest should easily cause change and reduce entropy within the genetic information of a population,
Do you understand that "survival of the fittest" would not cause change in any individual bird? It would not induce more mutations in favour of yellow birds. So how does the change occur in the population? And how would this reduce "genetic entropy" in the population?
but can it produce increased complexity? Certainly only if a change were significant enough to fuel selection.
Well, why not? I still don't see the basis of your problem with this. Nor do I see why it would need to trigger selection, rather than being--at least for a time--a neutral variation. Selection is needed to fix a trait in a population, but not to have it enter the population in the first place. (If that were the case, there would be no examples of harmful mutations.)
I thought mutations, were supposed to happen in small increments but from what I have learned so far it looks like it would take nothing less than a very large amount of genetic code to produce an appendage useful enough to kickstart the selection process.
In a sense you are right on both counts. Mutations create small changes in genes and (usually) in phenotypes. It would take a very large amount of genetic code to produce an appendage, but it doesn't follow that any large genetic changes are required all at once. They can and do occur in small increments.
Where you are going wrong is in assuming that the small increment is too small to be selected. No advantage is too small to be selected. There is no minimum level of advantage necessary to trigger natural selection.
And in some circumstances, even a neutral change can still become fixed in a population.
And if that is true, the odds that such a large amount of coherent code could arise nearly spontaneously would be astronomical. So to suggest that this has happened countless times with all of the species of life on earth just boggles my mind. How is it possible? Does any body know?
As notto noted, it is not just beneficial mutations that are happening. Right along with them, neutral and harmful mutations are happening too. The difference is that harmful mutations, and most neutral mutations, do not become fixed in the population and therefore do not accumulate one on top of another. So what we are left with after many generations is an apparently steady course toward a major change. But that's only because there is no record of the many side trails that once existed along the way.
say, outcrops of basalt and sandstone.
