Re: The difference between organism and ecosystem...

["Daniel A. Fiscus" <***>]

On Fri, 8 Jul 2005, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

>
> The 2nd law only relates to isolated systems.  There's no law against a
> process increasing order in a given locale (presumably at the expense of
> order in the whole in which that locale sits) if the process is
> connected to other systems (with order to spare).  So, establishing life
> elsewhere in the solar system would only establish that we are capable
> of creating order in a given local (or, more appropriately, moving order
> from one locale to another).  And, since this order-motion would,
> presumably, give off unstructured and un-harnessable energy, the total
> order in the whole system should decrease.
>
> Or have I misunderstood you?
>

Glen,

Thanks and good points. Only twist perhaps
is that we could say the solar system is
closed to solar energy, or at least most
people talk of life as if driven 100% by
solar energy in the ultimate source sense.
So to get beyond the solar system would
mean to mean that energy was harnessed from
inside a closed system - gravitational
energy and/or relational ____ something here,
maybe not energy if not physical.

You are right on about the cautions to not
reduce too far and to check against some old
and already used/known complementarity being
rehashed, like Yin Yang, particle-wave, or
other binary combos. Or perhaps worse than
rehash, to misapply as metaphor where not
appropriate, no evidence, etc. But I think
in this case it could be worth it. Not sure.

Dan