Evolution and the 2nd law of thermodynamics
I still recall being in high school when I learned of the creationist argument that evolution—that all life on earth is the product of descent with modification—violates the 2nd law of thermodymics, since it posits an increase in order over time. The creationist point is that the existence of a Creator is necessitated to override this iron law of physics.
As my father patiently explained, this argument treats planet earth as a closed energy system, which it decidedly is not. The earth is continuously flooded with generous amounts of solar energy, much of which is then transferred to outer space. The sun is continuously losing entropy and space is gaining entropy, and puny little earth is essentially in global entropic homeostasis.
At the time, and even until now, this has always satisfied me intuitively. But over at the evolution blog Panda’s Thumb, a creationist has been recycling the tired old violation of the 2nd law trope. Reading through the discussion thread, I found a link to the paper below, which does a nice back-of-the-envelope calculation for the solar energy flux on earth relative to the energy requirements to sustain the entropic cost of maintaining all life on the planet. Turns out, unsurprisingly, that there is way more energy than necessary to account for the entropic cost of evolution. Quelle surprise.
https://aapt.scitation.org/doi/10.1119/1.2973046
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