Problems of the Entropy Parameter

Eugene Barsky, Industrial Engeneering, Azrieli College of Engineering, Jerusalem, Israel




E Entropy is a generally accepted parameter of modern natural science, which evaluates the character and depth of the matter and energy transformations occurring in all material objects and processes. Apparently, this fact, together with some contradictory aspects of the physical meaning of entropy, have led to the situation that there is no other notion in the scientific literature worldwide causing so many controversies, discussions and speculations. This parameter was formulated more than 150 years ago, but the tension around it has not calmed down until today. During these years, thousands of scientific articles and books were devoted to entropy. They have suggested numerous interpretations, but have not given an unambiguous explanation of the objective physical meaning of entropy or stopped, until today, the flow of publications aimed at overcoming contradictions and paradoxes attributed to this notion. Such a situation in scientific literature has led to a negative attitude to the use of this parameter, since it is clear that a theory full of internal paradoxes and contradictions contains some flaw, and definitions allowing multiple interpretations are incomplete. Therefore, some publications substantiate a suggestion to reject, in general, the notion of entropy. In their analysis of natural phenomena and technological processes, the authors even state that entropy is a "cancer tumor of thermodynamics" destroying, finally, the harmony and logics of scientific world-view. But at the same time, the notion of entropy has stepped over the boundaries of not only thermodynamics, but also physics, and penetrated into many fields of today’s natural science.