From: John Cowan <cowan>
Message-Id: <199712180249.VAA19245@locke.ccil.org>
Subject: Re: demonstrating my ignorance
To: SIMEGEN-L@SIU.EDU
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 1997 21:49:58 -0500 (EST)
In-Reply-To:  <1.5.4.32.19971218023929.006b6a50@msumusik.mursuky.edu> from "Jean Lorrah" at Dec 17, 97 08:39:29 pm
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Jean Lorrah writes:

> Information?  Is this some specialized definition of the term?  Because we
> are constantly creating new information--it is an infinitely renewable
> resource, and we will never reach the point at which it all sits in a pool
> somewhere, going nowhere.  No, not even on the Internet.

Not infinitely.  The amount of entropy we dispose of is dwarfed by the amount
disposed of by DNA replication --- but even that is ABSOLUTELY INSIGNIFICANT
compared to the VAST amount of entropy created by hydrogen fusion in the Sun.
The Earth is an open system, and the Second Law does not apply to it ---
indeed, it does not apply *exactly* to any system short of the entire
universe.

-- 
John Cowan                                      cowan@ccil.org
                e'osai ko sarji la lojban.