open Tao/closed Tao

The introduction by Bertalanffy's concept of open system in 1968 did make a major step forward to solve a contradiction discussed at length by biologists in 1900s.

Every physical system in thermal equilibrium with the environment at a given temperature is governed by the laws of Classical Thermodynamics, particularly the Second Law, set out in 1824 by Sadi Carnot and later developed by Rudolf Clausius and Ludwig Boltzmann in the framework of Statistical Mechanics which introduced the concept of Entropy.

In the statistical formulation entropy is a measure of the order of the system, and the IInd Law states that the entropy of a system can only increase over time, defining an irreversible process of the system towards thermodynamic states of increasing disorder, until the so-called Heat Death of the system.

This is clearly contrary to what is observed in living biological systems, which draw more order from the disorder, as in the classical ORDO AB CHAOS


This contradiction is resolved whereas the classical thermodynamics applies to systems in thermal equilibrium with the environment, while biological open systems are far from equilibrium. The development of an off-equilibrium thermodynamics that take into account and applies to living systems has been made by the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1977 Ilya Prigogine in the 70s