Entropies and the Anthropocene crisis

Montévil, Maël

doi:10.1007/s00146-021-01221-0

Cited by 13 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 70 publications

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“…Other important analyzes on the nature of the complexity of living things were carried out by Hopfield ( 1994 ), Kauffman ( 2020 ) and Pattee ( 1969 , 1973 ). A formal treatment of the constraints present in highly complex systems that includes individuals, groups or organizations was carried out by Madden and Ashby ( 1972 ); Montévil's research ( 2021 ) is framed in the same area of very complex systems.…”

Section: Reviewing the Original Theoretical Views On The Biological Maxwell's Demonsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A use of the Kharkevich measure in a biological situation is found in Mizraji ( 1985 ). Recently, Montévil ( 2021 ) has published an investigation on highly complex systems generated by human societies and their multiple activities, which leads him to expand the thermodynamic framework to describe and analyze the dynamics of these systems. In this expansion, Montévil uses the notion of "anti-entropy" (Bailly and Longo 2009 ; Longo and Montévil, 2014 , Ch.9) to describe the coupling between biological organizations and their environment, where the local decrease in entropy is subject to strong constrictions.…”

Section: Catalysis By Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The biological Maxwell's demons: exploring ideas about the information processing in biological systems

Mizraji

2021

Theory Biosci.

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This work is based on ideas supported by some of the biologists who discovered foundational facts of twentieth-century biology and who argued that Maxwell's demons are physically implemented by biological devices. In particular, JBS Haldane first, and later J. Monod, A, Lwoff and F. Jacob argued that enzymes and molecular receptors implemented Maxwell's demons that operate in systems far removed from thermodynamic equilibrium and that were responsible for creating the biological order. Later, these ideas were extended to other biological processes. In this article, we argue that these biological Maxwell's demons (BMD) are systems that have information processing capabilities that allow them to select their inputs and direct their outputs toward targets. In this context, we propose the idea that these BMD are information catalysts in which the processed information has broad thermodynamic consequences.

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Section: Reviewing the Original Theoretical Views On The Biological Maxwell's Demonsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Catalysis By Informationmentioning

confidence: 99%

The biological Maxwell's demons: exploring ideas about the information processing in biological systems

Mizraji

2021

Theory Biosci.

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“…The entropy that we describe is conceptually distinct from physics's entropy because the latter has the physical dimension of energy by a temperature. Moreover, it accommodates the notion that entropy should be defined with respect to biological organizations and, more generally, viability (Montévil, 2021;Kauffman, 2020). We also emphasize that historicity has a double role in our reasoning.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 79%

“…The latter leads to a complementary quantity to the one of entropy, based on the entire possibility space's size at a given time. This quantity is reminiscent of the concept of anti-entropy, a complementary quantity to entropy intended to describe biological complexity (Bailly & Longo, 2009;Montévil, 2021). Additional integration between the approach developed here and the concept of anti-entropy will be the object of further work.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Disruption of biological processes in the Anthropocene: the case of phenological mismatch

Montévil

2022

Preprint

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Biologists increasingly report anthropogenic disruptions of both organisms and ecosystems, suggesting that these processes are a fundamental, qualitative component of the Anthropocene. Nonetheless, the notion of disruption has not yet been theorized in biology. To progress in that regard, we work on a special case. Relatively minor temperature changes impact plant-pollinator synchrony, disrupting mutualistic interaction networks. Understanding this phenomenon requires a specific rationale since models describing them use both historical and systemic reasoning. Specifically, history justifies that the system is initially in a very narrow part of the possibility space where it is viable, and the disruption randomizes this configuration. Building on this rationale, we develop a formal framework inspired by Boltzmann's entropy. With empirical networks, we show historical trends depending on latitude. Then we propose an initial definition of disruption in ecology. When a specific historical outcome contributes to a system's viability, disruption randomizes this outcome, decreasing viability.

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Information, Science and Democracy, for an Ethics of Scientific Knowledge

Longo

2020

Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics

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The modern theories of information opened to way to extraordinary new tools for communication and knowledge construction. When identified instead with the world (DNA is a complete information carrier and a program for ontogenesis, atomic particles and planets exchange information …), a new form of scientism affects knowledge and trust in science. Vague and implicit assumptions, with no precise references to the sciences of information, force strong consequences, in biology in particular. Similarly, the powerful optimization methods that make intelligible the dynamics of inert matter are expected or used to direct also human activities and replace human government by automatic governance. We are then meant to follow the formal, mechanical rule or the unique optimal path, instead of inventing new forms of sense in human interactions. Yet another fantastic tool, the newly available Big Data, is being considered to substitute scientific invention by correlations among numbers: fortunately, mathematics a priori shows that a deluge of spurious correlations may be found in any very large set of numbers. An ethics of knowledge may then be proposed in order to reconstruct the trust in science, as critical thinking at the heart of democracy.

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Entropies and the Anthropocene crisis

Cited by 13 publications

References 70 publications

The biological Maxwell's demons: exploring ideas about the information processing in biological systems

The biological Maxwell's demons: exploring ideas about the information processing in biological systems

Disruption of biological processes in the Anthropocene: the case of phenological mismatch

Information, Science and Democracy, for an Ethics of Scientific Knowledge

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