The book "Entropy and Information" deals with the thermodynamical concept of entropy and its relationship to information theory. It is successful in explaining the universality of the term "Entropy" not only as a physical phenomenon, but reveals its existence also in other domains. E.g., Volkenstein discusses the "meaning" of entropy in a biological context and shows how entropy is related to artistic activities. Written by the renowned Russian bio-physicist Mikhail V. Volkenstein, this book on "Entropy and Information" surely serves as a timely introduction to understand entropy from a thermodynamic perspective and is definitely an inspiring and thought-provoking book that should be read by every physicist, information-theorist, biologist, and even artist.
Author(s): Mikhail V. Volkenstein
Edition: 1
Year: 2009
Language: English
Pages: 220
Cover......Page 1
Series: Progress in Mathematical Physics Volume 57......Page 3
Title: Entropy and Information......Page 4
Copyright - ISBN: 3034600771......Page 5
Contents......Page 6
About the Author......Page 10
Preface......Page 12
Sadi Carnot......Page 14
Caloric......Page 15
The irreversibility of heat processes......Page 17
What did Carnot do?......Page 20
The Carnot cycle......Page 22
Thermodynamic temperature......Page 27
Lomonosov and the conservation laws......Page 30
The law of conservation of energy......Page 32
The second law......Page 34
The pressure of light......Page 35
Entropy......Page 36
The logarithm and exponential functions......Page 38
Calculation of entropy......Page 41
Measuring entropy experimentally......Page 45
Irreversible processes......Page 48
Obtaining useful work......Page 52
Equilibrium conditions......Page 54
A chemical reaction......Page 56
Melting of crystals and evaporation of liquids......Page 59
Why does alcohol dissolve in water yet gasoline not do so?......Page 60
Hydrophobic forces and the albumin globule......Page 62
What do rubber and an ideal gas have in common?......Page 64
Why do we heat a room?......Page 68
"The mistress of the world and her shadow"......Page 70
Why was Emden right?......Page 71
Boltzmann's formula......Page 74
Stirling's formula......Page 77
The meaning of Boltzmann's formula......Page 79
The fusion of a crystal and the evaporation of a liquid......Page 82
Entropic forces......Page 83
Entropy of equilibrium states......Page 87
A little quantum mechanics......Page 89
Gibbs' paradox......Page 91
Nernst's theorem......Page 92
The distribution of velocities, and temperature......Page 96
The barometric formula and the "gravitational perpetuum mobile"......Page 101
Fluctuations......Page 104
Why is the sky blue?......Page 109
The age of Darwin......Page 111
Laplace's demon and Sinai's billiard......Page 114
The fate of the universe......Page 118
The production and flow of entropy......Page 124
The dissipation function......Page 127
An astronaut lives on negative entropy......Page 130
Why do cells divide?......Page 135
Far from equilibrium......Page 136
The Belousov-Zhabotinski reaction......Page 142
Organisms as dissipative systems......Page 144
The three stages of thermodynamics......Page 149
Information and probability......Page 152
Informational entropy......Page 156
Information and entropy......Page 162
Maxwell's demon......Page 165
Obtaining and creating information......Page 168
The value of information......Page 171
The thermodynamics of living organisms......Page 176
Biological evolution, entropy, and information......Page 180
The value of biological information......Page 185
Complexity and irreplaceability......Page 192
Complexity and Gödel's theorem......Page 196
Information and artistic creation......Page 197
B......Page 208
C......Page 209
D......Page 210
E......Page 211
H......Page 213
I......Page 214
L......Page 215
O......Page 216
Q......Page 217
S......Page 218
T......Page 219
Z......Page 220
