Feynman, however, says the French physicist Sadi Carnot discovered the second law 25 years earlier (3). The second law was formulated after nineteenth century engineers noticed that heat cannot pass from a colder body to a warmer body by itself.Īccording to philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn, the second law was first put into words by two scientists, Rudolph Clausius and William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), using different examples, in 1850-51 (2). This means that a perpetual motion machine is impossible. The second law is a straightforward law of physics with the consequence that, in a closed system, you can't finish any real physical process with as much useful energy as you had to start with - some is always wasted. So why do people say that life violates the second law of thermodynamics? What is the second law of thermodynamics? This is not the case we know of nothing in the universe that violates that law. Sometimes people say that life violates the second law of thermodynamics. The use of thermodynamics in biology has a long history rich in confusion.
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