Evolution As Entropy (Science and Its Conceptual Foundations series)
This serious and scholarly tome unites the theory of biological evolutioni.e., that biological systems tend to become more ordered and highly structured through evolutionary timewith the seemingly contradictory second law of thermodynamicsi.e., that disorder or entropy increases over time. The authors argue that , in fact, living systems exhibit growing complexity and self-organization as a result of increasing entropy. They support their difficult yet logical arguments with a wide range of examples taken from developmental biology, embryology, morphology, population genetics, systematics, and community ecology. Not easy going for the casual reader, but well worth the effort for others. Recommended for academic collections .P. Robert Paustian, Wilkes Coll. Lib., Wilkes-Barre, Pa.Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.