Talk:Entropy (energy dispersal)

Archives

 * Archive: Talk:Entropy/Archive 2 [(Jul)'06-(Sep)'06], 165 kilobytes (related archive)
 * Archive: Talk:Entropy/Archive 4 (Oct)'06, 84 kilobytes
 * Note: AFD: Entropy (energy dispersal); result: there was no-consensus, defult to "keep"

NPOV
Has nobody noticed that putting a particular theory on a separate page is completely in contradiction to NPOV? The only way to do something of the sort within the rules might be to link to an external source. It is really just the same as Origin of species (Biology) and origin of species (biblical). And the article itself is not exactly encylopedic standards. And, coming from outside a little, perhaps changing this title to entropy (teaching methods) and including several alternate ways of presenting it might solve the problem of how to do it. I understand the difficulty of presenting exact theory in beginning courses, since I have been facing the challenge of presenting entropy to beginning Library & Inf Sci students, totally lacking a scientific background of any sort. (I use analogies.) DGG 05:03, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes – see Talk:Entropy .. .dave souza, talk 10:47, 13 October 2006 (UTC)


 * This change is a work in progress. Entropy is a huge topic; the trend has been to use mini-articles with "links to main" on central page or to use "see also" and then put the rest on a separate page. --Sadi Carnot 12:20, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

New page cleaning tasks
I have found this "dispersal" perspective used in Starr's Biology - the Unity and Diversity of Life textbook (1992), 6th Ed. and Atkins book The Second Law (1984). Either Atkins is the primary source of this perspective or there is someone else who started this concept; in either case it would be good to find the correct historical basis for this idea. I am going to make a short header article on the entropy page with a link to main.

One issue we will have to correct on this page is the book list. I have Ebbing's General Chemistry 3rd Ed. (1990) and Brown's Chemistry - the Central Science 9th Ed. (2003) and they both use the disorder perspective. I am going to assume that the newer additions use the dispersal perspective? Yet, I question this because I also have Sagan's book Into the Cool (2005) and it does talk about Frank L. Lambert (pgs. 82-84), but these four pages devoted to Lambert's ideas (out of 267 other authors cited in the book) talk about chemical kinetics, Murphy's law, and activation energy not about "energy dispersal"? This leads me to question the entire list on this page that was submitted by Frank Lambert; maybe it is just a list of books that mentions his work, but not necessarily energy dispersal? I will remove Sagan's book for now and we will have to clean the rest of the list to so to include only those books that mention energy dispersal specifically and cite the actual pages and reference sentences directly. Perhaps Lambert can aid in this task? I also don't like the words "teaching approach"...it doesn't make any sense. --Sadi Carnot 12:12, 27 October 2006 (UTC)


 * In order to support an assertion such as " a number of recent chemistry texts" blah blah, we cannot resort to compiling the list ourselves since that constitutes original research.  The assertion is unsourced, and, as you already found, dubious.  The only kind of reliable source would be a review of recent pedagogical approaches in recent P.chem texts in a peer-reviewed journal.98.109.238.95 (talk) 03:30, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Poor Boltzmann
Can pls somebody give a specific reference where Boltzmann used the term "Unordnung" (disorder). I don't have the complete works at hand but only the selected works in Ostwalds Klassiker der exakten Wissenschaften Band 286, and I can't find it used. IMHO it's also completely out of his usual diction. Most often he is using "Permutabilzätsmaß", i.e. the number of microstates. --Pjacobi 17:21, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Boltzmann used the term molar-ordered and molar-disordered (pg. 40) in his Gas Lectures (Dover reprint). Also, I know that Helmholtz used the term in 1882, i.e. from entropy (order and disorder), in 1882 Hermann von Helmholtz used the word "Unordnung" (disorder) to describe entropy.
 * Later: --Sadi Carnot 04:50, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Sadi, since you were thoughtful to mirror the Archives pertinent to Pjacobi's question, I thought you would include a lead to my extended discussion of Boltzmann and his innocent use of 'disorder' -- in the sense that he was speaking prior to detailed knowledge of molecular behavior, before quantization of energy, before the third law, and without knowledge of the "Boltzmann entropy equation". Thus came his unfortunate simplistic statement that then shaped conceptual thought for over a century -- on p. 443 after more than 400 pages (US translation) of still-powerful theory. Here's the lead: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Entropy/Archive2#Disorder, and here's the seminal paragraph:
 * “In order to explain the fact that the calculations based on this assumption correspond to actually observable processes, one must assume that an enormously complicated mechanical system represents a good picture of the world, and that all or at least most of the parts of it surrounding us are initially in a very ordered – and therefore very improbable – state. When this is the case, then whenever two of more small parts of it come into interaction with each other the system formed by these parts is also initially in an ordered state and when left to itself it rapidly proceeds to the disordered most probable state.” (Final paragraph of #87, p. 443.)
 * 'Order to disorder' -- on this slight basis of "If the result is 'disordered', the initial state must have been 'ordered'". Even a genius can err if he does not have adequate data. FrankLambert 05:09, 9 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, thank you Frank, this is a good section; I'll add it to entropy (order and disorder). However, "theories on molecular behavior" go back farther than Boltzmann.  In 1859, for example, Maxwell was writing about "variations in the velocities of atoms and molecules".  In 1862, Clausius was speaking of "changes in the arrangements of the molecules" in terms of molecular disgregation.  See also: History of the molecule (an article I recently wrote). Later: --Sadi Carnot 19:16, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Student point of view
User:Dave souza keeps writing stuff in this article using the word "student" all over the place. This, by far, is not in line with WP:NPOV. Moreover, since this whole dispersal debate began, I have read several of the historical books on this dispersal approach, and they do not repeat the word "student" all over the place. Souza is obviously greatly influenced by Frank L. Lambert's websites. Wikipedia is supposed to be written so to be available to a world audience of all ages. I would suggest he clean this article accordingly. --Sadi Carnot 05:02, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Good point, thanks for picking this up. As suggested, I've copyedited the article to make it more general and in line with the historical background now shown. .. dave souza, talk 09:47, 9 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Looks better, good work. I've found that the English chemical engineer Kenneth Denbigh, in his 1955 textbook The Principles of Chemical Equilibrium, was the first to use the spreading and sharing of energy approach to entropy (although he doesn't use the word "dispersal" per se).  Later: --Sadi Carnot 19:34, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

"The world audience of all ages ..."
This concept of the audience is central to the whole concept of Wikipedia. We must be wary of it being dominated by academics of the wrong kind.
 * Peer review will sort you out there ;-). 84.227.234.163 (talk) 09:03, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

The article says in a condescending way - "By giving concrete examples, this approach is effective in explaining entropy to assist those who have great difficulty in grasping mathematical abstractions."
 * My difficulty with thermodynamics is just the opposite -- the concepts are often incomprehensible because they are not formulated in proper mathematical language. I had a similar difficulty with special and general relativity when I was only exposed to popular and heuristic explanations -- including the presentations in introductory university physics textbooks. Only the full math helped. As annoying as the math may be, leaving it out does not improve things. Once you have it, "all bugs are shallow" so to speak. 84.227.234.163 (talk) 09:03, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I would supplement this comment with - "Those who have a grasp of the mathematical abstraction and have no idea of (or don't care about) the concrete examples really have no understanding at all."

People such as Galileo, Newton, Kelvin, Maxwell, Einstein and so on were well aware of their concrete examples and followed up with the mathematical analysis. Read them and you will see what I mean.

Anyone who proclaims "I can follow the maths therefore I know all about it so I need know nothing of concrete examples" are fakes. They give academics a bad name. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.9.185.137 (talk) 03:40, 23 February 2007 (UTC).

Very Deeply Flawed Article
This article purports to discuss a scientific fact, but is entirely non-factual. It is nothing more than an opinion without basis in fact ... and it doesn't even uphold Wikipedia standards for discussing an opinion. It is little more than a long advertisement for the publications of the Lambert / Leff team.

As Daniel Moynihan was fond of saying, people are entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts.

The content of this article is directly contradicted by other Wikipedia articles and by standard sources including well-esteemed textbooks. There is no way to convert this article to a neutral POV opinion without making it self-contradictory. There is no way to promote it from opinion to fact, because it directly contradicts immutable observable physical facts.

The argument that the "energy dispersal" approach has pedagogical advantages is without merit. There is no value in a convenient way of teaching wrong facts. --Jsd 08:43, 8 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Not according to the sources. If you've sources contesting the usefulness of this approach, please present them. . dave souza, talk 09:58, 8 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Agree with dave souza. Many new textbooks shows your assertion, that this approach does not have pedagogical advantages, to be false. The article is well sourced. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  22:02, 8 April 2009 (UTC)
 * The article is very poorly sourced indeed. Personal websites should not be used at all.  Stray articles in a pedagogical journal are also not reliable.  A review article on all the recent trends in entropy pedagogy would be the only possible reliable source, and I do not see that here.98.109.238.95 (talk) 03:37, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

It is always possible to find sources in support of an opinion. That does not however promote it from opinion to fact. The article remains grossly counterfactual. Finding grossly erroneous incorrect information in introductory chemistry texts is like finding sand at the beach. Correct factual information can be found in e.g. Need I go on? --Jsd 00:25, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Ludwig Boltzmann, Vorlesungen über Gastheorie 2 vol. (J.A. Barth, Leipzig; 1896 and 1898).
 * Enrico Fermi, Thermodynamics (1936)
 * Claude Shannon, “A Mathematical Theory of Communication” Bell System Technical Journal (1948).
 * Richard Feynman, Statistical Mechanics (1972)
 * Kittel & Kroemer, Thermal Physics (1980)
 * Could I remind you that wikipedia is not about facts. We do not decide whether something is true or false. We write about what is notable, i.e what has been noted by others and reported in reliable sources so it is verifiable. Lambert's proposal is notable because it has been noticed and it is now used in very many textbooks. Your texts may say something else, but that is not relevant to this article. I would also point out that they are all prior to the articles written about the diffusion of energy idea, so do not comment directly on it. If you have sources that directly criticize Lambert's ideas, then let us have them. The article should include what they say. That is what WP:NPOV is about. We report all views that are in reliable sources. If you want my thoughts as a scientist and educator, I do not think Lambert's ideas are counter factual or in opposition to what the "greats" of thermodynamics you quote say, but I do think that they are a better way of introducing entropy to students, particularly those in physical chemistry. I also respect Peter Atkins' judgment on this. He has authored one of the key textbooks in physical chemistry for several decades and 8 editions. He moved to this idea of dispersal of energy in the 8th edition. Other textbook authors have done the same, and I understand more are doing so for editions to be published soon. However, this is not the place to discuss the science, but the article.-- Bduke   (Discussion)  01:19, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is not about facts??? WTF? If there are facts, they can be backed up by reliable sources. Thus, you are contradicting yourself in what you are saying. Geez. Nageh (talk) 16:31, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Bduke's line of reasoning is not applicable to this article, since the article has not found one reliable source for its assertions.98.109.238.95 (talk) 03:37, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

There is no problem with articles based on fiction, such as the Hogwarts article. The problem arises when somebody tries to pass off a fictional article as fact. NPOV standards require that when an opinion is controversial, the controversy should be examined, and conflicting opinions should be given fair treatment.

At the very least, the admonition that "Wikipedia is not about facts" should be prominently featured in the energy dispersal article.

It is unlikely that a scholarly article directly contradicting "energy dispersal" will ever be published, because the article would merely be a restatement of overwhelmingly well-tested conventional ideas. It would be like publishing an article contradicting the "earth is flat" opinion. And besides, what would it matter? In this discussion, nobody has even bothered to claim that the article is factual; the crux of the argument is that facts don't matter.
 * I just added a reliable source, I liked your source too but it's true that as a personal blog it is not a reliable source. A book published by World Scientific is, just barely, a reliable source. (I once saw a list of "predatory journals" and "predatory publishers" which included World Scientific!! But that is not fair.  They do peer review a lot of their stuff, and are not predatory.)98.109.238.95 (talk) 03:37, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

So let's agree that facts don't matter, mark the article as non-factual, and move on. OK? --Jsd 01:37, 9 April 2009 (UTC)


 * No. First, "nobody has even bothered to claim that the article is factual". I claimed that it is not contrary to what the "greats" said. Second, "It is unlikely that a scholarly article directly contradicting "energy dispersal" will ever be published". Not so, since this approach is widely used in many textbooks, it is quite likely that a critical article will be written, if anybody agrees with you. Third, "somebody tries to pass off a fictional article as fact". Nobody is doing that. We are reporting on a notable approach to the teaching of entropy. Forth, "conflicting opinions should be given fair treatment". Of course they should, so find some sources for these opinions. We do not edit from original research. Finally, "the crux of the argument is that facts don't matter". No, we agree that they matter, but we do not decide them. We report what others say about them. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  01:48, 9 April 2009 (UTC)


 * If you want to talk about energy dispersal, fine, talk about energy dispersal. But you must not call it entropy.  Call it the Flambert Function or some such if you wish.  Entropy has a single conventional definition that is used in a dozen different fields and subfields of science and technology.  The community simply will not permit you to redefine it.


 * The claim that the article is "not contrary to what the greats said" is false. The well-validated classic references define entropy one way, while the article attempts to define it in another way.  The two definitions are not equivalent.  The Flambert Function is not the same as entropy ... not conceptually the same and not numerically equal.  It takes only a moment to think up situations where the degree of energy dispersal is decreasing while the entropy is increasing.  Therefore in this article, every sentence that uses the word "entropy" contradicts all standard references on the subject. --Jsd 07:24, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm still waiting for somebody to claim that the article is factual. --Jsd 02:15, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I think you are really misunderstanding what this is about. Who are you, BTW, to commit the community to "The community simply will not permit you to redefine it"? Anyway, this does not redefine entropy. It explains it in a different way, and in a way that is better for teaching entropy to people who do not have a strong background in physics, such as many chemists. Have you read Peter Atkins' "Physical Chemistry"? Atkins is a very rigorous physical chemist who has used the traditional approach in 7 editions of his book. He had a good reason to change the approach in the 8th. Several other texts have done the same. That approach deserves an article on wikipedia. If you think they should not be doing that, then write an article in something like "The Journal of Chemical Education" and try to convince them. Wikipedia is not the place to have that argument. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  08:36, 9 April 2009 (UTC)


 * The article is factual, it states that this is a method of introducing entropy to students which is in use in a number of respected textbooks. Jed's confusion may have arisen from the non-standard way that the introductory paragraph of the lead was written, I've revised it in a way that should fully meet Jed's objections. All written descriptions of entropy are analogies, and Jed's personal preference for older analogies is irrelevant to Wikipedia where verification of different views on a subject is required. . dave souza, talk 08:56, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
 * This claim is unsourced. I just flagged it as needing a reliable source.98.109.238.95 (talk) 03:37, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

The changes to the lead paragraph do not fully meet my objections. They do not address my objections at all.

Please do not muddy the waters with remarks about my "personal preference for older analogies". The authoritative references I cited do not offer older analogies; they offer facts, or rather fact singular, since the definition of entropy has not changed in many many decades. Personal preference has got nothing to do with it. Facts are facts, whether they are "preferred" or not. Analogies and models do not have equal status with facts. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts. The failure of this article to distinguish fact from opinion is central to this discussion.

If you want a moderately detailed citable explanation of why "energy dispersal" is not equivalent to entropy, see Misconceptions about Spreading
 * Could you give us some information about this link? It does not look anywhere near to being a reliable source that verifies anything. It just looks like an attempt by one person to describe entropy and s/he sees it. Who wrote it? -- Bduke   (Discussion)  23:05, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The suggestion that the article merely presents a factual arm's-length description of a fallacious pedagogical model, without itself partaking of the fallacy, is intriguing but insufficient. The article does not in fact maintain arm's length, and does not uphold a neutral point of view. To do so it would need to discuss the pros and the cons of the model.


 * For starters, one must wonder why the "energy dispersal" article includes a long discussion of "disorder" as a model for entropy. This is the lamest of straw-man arguments.  Yes, "disorder" is a poor model, but so what?  As the saying goes, there is no glory in outstripping donkeys.  A properly neutral article would compare "energy dispersal" to all the competing models, not just the lamest one.


 * Even the article's title is evidence against the suggestion that this is an arm's-length review of a pedagogical model. It purports to be an article about entropy, but it is not.  So at best the title is misleading.  If somebody were to write an article called "Entropy/Pedagogical Models" that made a good-faith effort toward even-handed review of the available models, many of the present objections would not apply.

The suggestion that the article does not "redefine" entropy is similarly intriguing but insufficient. In some places the article dodges the issue by using weasel words such as "exposited" in lieu of "defined". But weasel words are by themselves contrary to Wikipedia standards. Also restating the second law is tantamount to redefining entropy, whether you call it a redefinition or not. --Jsd 10:24, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
 * The maths remains the same, the lame but regrettably common disorder analogy is discarded. The facts remain the same. If you've got a source reviewing different teaching models, work up a new article, but that doesn't affect the legitimacy of this article. Your arguments fail WP:TALK and unless you present properly sourced detailed proposals these discussions should be archived. . dave souza, talk 22:21, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The assertion that "the maths remains the same" is both OR and error. A source has been cited that explains in simple terms why energy-spreading is not the same as entropy. Besides, whatever happened to the reminder that "Wikipedia is not about facts"? Are you now arguing that the article gives a mathematically factual account of entropy? --Jsd 22:56, 9 April 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jsd (talk • contribs)

Frank Lambert all over the place
All the external links pointing to one single place? Is this appropriate? DVdm (talk) 11:40, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

POV tag added
I've added a POV tag, because I share the concerns raised in the two discussion sections immediately above (also DGG's comments further up about WP:POVFORK). The article at the moment sees extremely one-sided and unbalanced, boosterish and uncritical throughout, with energy dispersal assertively presented as "the solution" to the pedagogical question.

The article in my view should be more cautious.

The reason that "energy dispersal" is useful is that, in everyday circumstances, the number of ways to distribute the energy around is much the largest significant contribution to the entropy. That's an important point, very valuable, and well justifies the existence of this article. But the article should also caution that, in and of itself, energy dispersal is not the fundamental meaning of entropy. A couple of examples may help to make this more concrete:


 * Zero-point configurational entropy. -- A real stretch to discuss this as shuffling energy around, as we're at an energy minimum; plus the state in which what zero-point energy there is is most dispersed is not necessarily the state with the lowest (configurational) entropy.
 * Entropy of black holes -- Here the entropy is actually higher when the energy is less dispersed. Concentrating the energy in the black hole makes more black hole quantum states accessible, far outweighing the parallel reduction of the number of states in free space.

There is also to my mind a danger with too closely associating entropy with energy, because this raises a barrier to the more fundamental, more general notion of entropy as more properly a dimensionless quantity, as reflected in information theory.

It would be useful to recall that a given formulation is not invalid simply because it does not cover all possible scenarios. The obvious example of this is the Newtonian view vs. the Einsteinian view. A useful approach would be to initially teach entropy as energy dispersal with a nod (either explicitly or through careful wording) given to the broader view. Davidr222 (talk) 14:16, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

To be fair, we do briefly touch on the idea of configuration entropy and entropy of mixing; but then only to uncritically retail Frank Lambert's material from his CalPoly talk (a talk which to me reads more like a desperate attempt to bale out a boat holed below the waterline).

There's no doubt that the "energy dispersal" has been a valuable and significant contribution to the language for introducing and discussing the idea of entropy -- as witnessed by its wide uptake. An article here is certainly appropriate. But it is an article that also needs to be appropriately judicious, detached and neutral; and must consider the limitations, as well as the value, of such language. Jheald (talk) 11:46, 3 December 2010 (UTC)


 * One further issue is that, reading the article, the reader may be led to think that what ultimately matters is the number of different local states the energy is dispersed over. It would be good if the reader would be led to see that the reason this is important is that under everyday circumstances, this spatial spreading is what leads to the number of different available global states to be greatest (per the demonstration given early on in most books on statistical mechanics.


 * A section limitations of the energy-dispersal picture might be a good addition, to present this idea, and then introduce ideas like non-energy configuration entropy, and entropy increase of things (and energy) falling into black holes. Jheald (talk) 00:59, 6 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I've never found the need for this description of entropy in chemical thermodynamics, where it is supposed to clarify 'entropy'. It does seem to apply to the glass of melting ice-water, in the article entropy. That's because the equilibrium transformation occurs at a constant temperature, which is generally not the case. Chemical thermodynamics is a theory: the classical thermodynamics of chemical phenomena: it would be nice if both definitions and descriptions remain within the theory, which has been cast in a deductive form.


 * In my little applications to geology, the definition of entropy is the partial derivative of the Gibbs energy divided by a variable T, as the state travels an equilibrium path. Temperature varies. My personal description of entropy is analogous to the buffering capacity of the system's energy with respect to changes in its temperature. If 'energy dispersion' could be either defined or described within the theory of classical thermodynamics, I could better judge its validity and value: its POV. -Geologist 209.218.108.22 (talk) 02:37, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree that this boosterish article should simply be deleted. F. Lambert's website is not a reliable source. A few stray papers supporting his concepts does not add up to a reliable source either. As far as I can tell, the assertions about "many new textbooks" are unsupported. When I looked randomly through google books, most of them were print-on-demand books from "publishers" without any reputation for peer review, so, none of those texts count as a reliable source. The Eighth Ed. of Atkins is the one exception, but even so: giving a minority point of view representation out of all proportion to its acceptance in the science community as a whole is biassed. Furthermore, when I look at the google snippet views of the 8th edn of Atkins's book, I see that the description by the editors in this article are a gross misrepresentation of the book. The discussions of lambda phase transitions are full of references to order and disorder transitions. And such phase transitions are an important application of entropy, and very much cutting edge research today. 98.109.238.95 (talk) 00:47, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Furthermore, the use of the "dispersal of energy" intuition seems to constantly lead to its own misunderstandings. For example, and this from a published article, "Entropy increase involves an increase in the number of accessible microstates among which the energy of a system can be distributed. Thus, there is only one kind of entropy change in a system: the spreading of energy among a changed number of accessible microstates"  Now look at that carefully. The author essentially needs to switch away from the idea of dispersion to the idea of "number of accessible microstates" which is approximately Boltzmann's W, the thermodynamic probability. And the rest of the article does indeed use only the number of accessible microstates, abandoning the idea of dispersion. But the idea that energy of the system can be "dispersed" among different microstates is the typical confusion that Lambert's idea leads to. The energy of an assembly can be distributed or dispersed between different systems in the Gibbsian assembly. The energy of a system can be distributed or dispersed between the components of that system, as in Boltzmann. But energy can never be distributed between different microstates. I have seen this error in the partisans of the "dispersal of energy" pov over and over. In fact, I believe one of the editors of this page had to have it pointed out to them in archived talk pages by someone arguing for the deletion of a similar article elsewhere. Thank goodness that error is no longer perpetrated here, but it goes to show the dangers of this pedagogical approach. 98.109.238.95 (talk) 04:10, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

/* Solution: entropy as energy dispersal */ unsourced assertion, dubious
I have never seen an objective survey of the recent textbooks' treatment of entropy. This dubious unsourced assertion needs to be buttressed or removed. Note: providing a list of such texts is original research. This assertion needs a citation to a pedagogical survey article that supports this assertion. And, "publication" by a print-on-demand service such as Cenpage or alphascript does not count.98.109.238.95 (talk) 02:38, 29 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree that Lambert's survey is not independent, but he does list the textbooks and you can look at them to test whether his assertion that they now talk about energy dispersal is correct. Whether energy dispersal is a correct way of talking about thermodynamics or not, there is no doubt that many chemistry textbooks (in particular) see it as a good way to introduce entropy to chemistry students. I have followed Atkins' "Physical Chemistry" since the first edition and used many of the editions to teach physical chemistry to chemistry students. He has certainly changed his approach over the years and the later editions certainly use energy dispersal. One problem is that people do not write papers comparing different textbooks. -- Bduke    (Discussion)  07:24, 29 June 2013 (UTC)No digestion routine selected by BogLdR
 * You are seriously mistaken on both main counts. The characterisation of atkins's new edition was a gross distortion of that textbook, I edited it, but that shows how reliable the editors's assertions are.  Secondly, they do indeed write reviews of textbooks, and usually of four or five at a time.  There are also reviews of pedagogical approaches as a whole.  But more importantly, Wikipedia policy is perfectly explicit about sourcing.  It is irrelevant whether Lambet'´s personal website is objective or independent or not.  It is a personal website and so cannot be used to support an assertion on Wikipedia.  Policy is also fairly explicit about use of stray scholarly articles. Such articles in isolation do not constitute a reliable source since they do not show what level of acceptance by the general scholarly community in that field obtains for the assertion at hand.  The paragraphs which are little more than digests of Lambert's own website, and with no other source than his posts on that website, should be removed as soon as possible.  The paragraphs which rely on only a few papers should also eventually be removed.  98.109.238.95 (talk) 14:08, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Encyclopedic style vs. textbook style
Some of the qualities or strategies that can be good for a textbook or a class lecture can be totally inappropriate for an encyclopedia article. For this reason, the mere fact that something has been found useful by some students is (almost) totally irrelevant to our decisions here. In general, a good pedagogical strategy might be to first present a simplification, an imprecise "big picture" slogan, with a clear example, and put in the careful details slowly, in stages. But this is the wrong approach for an encyclopedia article. Or, even more drastically, I have seen reputable engineering textbooks never get around to dotting the i's and crossing the t's, acting as if every probability distribution were absolutely continuous.

But an encyclopedia article is supposed to be a reference. It is not our duty to teach beginners, although one hopes they can learn something. Beginners can find out what the keyword is about, and be steered to good textbooks. The duty of a reference work is to clearly state everything correctly in light of the accepted state of the art. Usually, reference work is for someone who already knows something but is wondering about, e.g., whether their text might have made a mistake, might have left something out, maybe is old-fashioned, what is the current state of the art, etc. Too many science contributors to Wikipedia are trying to rewrite the articles in the image of their favourite textbook, i.e., what worked for them when they learned it. This is its own peculiar kind of lack of npov. So, if something in an article is too dense or "legalistic" or convoluted for a beginner to grasp it the first time they read it, tough.

So even without knowing that the "energy dispersal" point of view is scientifically incorrect, we should be able to decide to delete this article simply on the grounds of the inappropriateness, for an encyclopedia, of an article about the pedagogical effectiveness of an approach to teaching entropy. This article reads as if someone were trying to write a review article for a chemistry pedagogy journal. Well, go ahead and write it and then submit it to a journal. Wikipedia is not for original research or synthesis, which is what is being included here.98.109.238.95 (talk) 21:12, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Atkins and de Paulo, Eighth edition, misrepresented in earlier edits
Here are two exact quotes from the googlebooks preview of the text in question.

"The concept of the number of microstates makes quantitative the ill-defined qualitative concepts of 'disorder' and 'the dispersal of matter and energy' that are used widely to introduce the concept of entropy: a more 'disorderly' distribution of energy and matter corresponds to a greater number of microstates associated with the same total energy." --- p. 81

p. 143. "This increase in entropy is what we expect when one gas disperses into the other and the disorder increases."

The earlier version of this article was a gross misrepresentation of the relation between this edition of the text and the theory of "energy dispersal". This calls into question the reliability of the editors' interpretations of the other textbooks on the list. Compiling that list is either copying from some unreliable website, at least, no reliable source for the list is given, or it constitutes interpretation and original research by the editor, which is inappropriate. The entire article should be deleted, so should Carthage, and this section should then be delted, to. And the second 'e' in deleted, too.98.109.238.95 (talk) 00:09, 30 June 2013 (UTC)
 * First, could you explain what you mean by "so should Carthage"? I have no idea.
 * Second, I do not have the 8th edition to hand as I am now retired and do not teach Physical Chemistry. However, I think you might be picking quotes. The p 143 quote is, I think, from the discussion on the entropy of mixing. For some reason that section remains the essentially the same as in earlier editions. It has not been updated to explain entropy in terms of energy dispersal. Does you googlebooks preview have the whole book? As far back as the 5th edition in 1994, which is the only one I have on my bookshelf, Atkins has a discussion of dispersal of energy in section 4.1 on pages 120 - 122.
 * Third, a brief comment on the section above this one. I do not think this article is aimed at teaching students. I think it is here because the idea of using energy dispersal to teach entropy is notable, because it it has been mentioned by many authors. It is not just about Lambert. The history section gives several references to the literature. There are others. I will look for one that I thought was in the article but it is not, at least in the current version.
 * Finally, this article does need improving and you have made a start at that. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  00:35, 30 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Carthago delenda est -- the 2nd Century BC equivalent of "Nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure". Eventually the Romans did. Jheald (talk) 13:33, 1 July 2013 (UTC)


 * The earlier edit, and context, implied that Atkins had switched from the old-fashioned, from now on let me call it normal, to the updated, but I really cannot agree with you and Prof. L in calling it that, "e3nergy-dispersal" approach. To disprove that Atkins has abandoned the normal approach, I only have to find two or three quotations where he uses it.  All you have to do is google inside the book on 'entropy disorder' and you will find plenty of them.  Please remind me whether Prof. L. considers entropy of mixing to be thermodynamic entropy or not.  I remember that on his site and papers he makes a big issue of entropy of mixing.98.109.238.95 (talk) 16:33, 1 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I do not recall what Lambert says about entropy of mixing and I am too busy to find out. On Atkins' 8th edition, I am not totally disagreeing with you. My recollection is that Atkins has made a significant shift in how he presents entropy from earlier editions, but that the shift is not consistent throughout. So he has not entirely abandoned what you call the normal approach. Like a good educator he uses different approaches, even where the purists might say they do not match together too well. Also when bringing out a new edition, it is clear that he concentrates on some sections and leaves others alone. The section on entropy of mixing for example is well removed from the general section on entropy. It will be interesting to see the next edition. I will try to find a copy in a library and look at it in more detail. It needs more that just googling. It needs a balanced judgement on the approaches that he takes. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  23:50, 1 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Ok, but it is against Wikipedia policy for editors to interpret sources such as ATkins or any of the other texts on the list. One of the reasons for this policy is precisely what you just said: 'it needs a balanced judgement on the approaches that he takes.'  And that constitutes OR or interpretation.  If you admit that there is no reliable source that evaluates textbooks as to their adoption or non-adoption of the 'energy dispersal' POV, then we are estopped from writing an article on it.  And common sense would say that if no scholarly journal has deigned to commission a review article on this issue, then it is not yet notable enough for an encyclopedia article, either. 98.109.238.95 (talk) 01:30, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * No, you are misunderstanding me. I am well aware of policy, so please do not lecture me about it. Writing wikipedia is not something where we disallow judgement. It is not a mindless operation using sources. Of course we need sources, but we also need to evaluate them. I do not "admit that there is no reliable source that evaluates textbooks as to their adoption or non-adoption of the 'energy dispersal' POV". There may well be, but it may be that we have not got one referenced on this article. I have not looked at all the references in detail for a while. I have not read Leff. Have you? There may also, for example, be a reputable review of the Atkins book that discusses how he has changed his viewpoint. We can also reference the text itself, particularly if the author referred to a change of approach in the preface. I would also point about that if many editors read that textbook and agree that he has shifted, there is unlikely to be a challenge. Lambert has made a good case that textbooks for teaching physical chemistry have changed in this respect. If he had written it in a paper for the Journal of Chemical Education which is strongly refereed, it would be a good source, but his web site is not. Material that is not challenged should not be removed just because there is no good reference. I was merely pointing that I think that you may be challenging this material based on an inadequate reading of the text. So let us leave this until I at least can have a good look at the 8th edition, and I would hope you might do the same. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  02:56, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I did challenge this, and other things. So have other people, over the years.  Who put that list there and where did they get it from? I take it that you did not put it there, since you admit you did not look carefully at the book.  I doubt any of the editors evaluated any of the books on that list.  I suspect that the list was copied from an unreliable source.  I am not going to go look at Atkins in hard copy if none of the other editors did.  There is no presumption in favour of maintaining unsourced dubious items on this page, especially in light of the many negative comments from qualified experts such as Prof. Baez of UC which it has received.  Finally, thermodynamics is part of Physics, not Chemistry (look it up in the dictionary, where it says 'a branch of Physics.'  It is a branch of Physics which chemists have to learn, but a chemistry prof. is less reliable on Physics than a Physics text...¿remember Cold Fusion?98.109.238.95 (talk) 16:04, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * What's with the mention of Cold Fusion?--82.137.11.218 (talk) 00:00, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
 * I think the list is from Lambert's web site and I think he has discussed it at American Chemical Society meetings, but I do not know whether it was ever published. I take your point that entropy is physics and not chemistry, but there is no call to use that to say Chemistry Profs are less reliable. A war between chemistry and physics is not helpful. Those of us who teach and research in physical chemistry have to bridge both disciplines and many of us actually have physics degrees not chemistry degrees. Anyway, Lett is I think a Physics Prof. However, the key point of chemists having to learn about entropy is that they find it very hard to learn with physics approaches using language and concepts that they find very foreign. This is getting worse as fewer students have studied physics at High School. Lecturers find it very hard to teach and the use of energy dispersal has proved to be a valuable way and it is a notable concept for that reason alone, as well as it having played a role in the history of the development of entropy. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  21:57, 2 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the IP is thinking of a spherical cow? Terms and approaches vary across disciplines. In the same way that love means nothing to a tennis player... dave souza, talk 22:27, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

At least change the title -- it does not accurately reflect the subject of the article
I've added a template at the top about the title.

This article, as stated in the lead, is about a method or approach for teaching the topic of entropy; it is not an article about the topic of entropy itself.

The title makes it appear to be an article about Entropy itself, but distinguished as a different meaning or concept of Entropy that needs to be qualified with "(energy dispersal)" for disambiguation of the topic.

DavRosen (talk) 07:10, 21 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Fair point. What do you suggest, "Energy dispersal (entropy)"? "Energy dispersal interpretation of approach to teaching entropy"? "Entropy as energy dispersal"? Cesiumfrog (talk) 13:07, 21 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I proposed the alternative title Energy dispersal pedagogy for thermodynamic entropy in the box at the top of the article; Energy dispersal approach to teaching entropy isn't bad, though "approach" sounds less encyclopedic to me, and I think it's useful to make it clear that it's for the concept in thermodynamics, not for example in information theory.   As it stands now, this article is a bait-and-switch, its title making it appear to be an article about a scientific term/concept/quantity but then stating in the lead that it's about "an introductory method of teaching the thermodynamic concept of entropy" instead, which is quite a different type of topic.  DavRosen (talk) 17:04, 21 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I think that's too cumbersome for a title. I propose Energy dispersal pedagogy (entropy) or more simply Energy dispersal (entropy). Cesiumfrog (talk) 08:47, 22 July 2013 (UTC)


 * It's more important that it's a pedagogy for entropy than the name of this one particular pedagogy. DavRosen (talk) 14:57, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Broadening the scope of this article to include more than one point of view
Come to think of it, the article should really be about any and all notable Entropy pedagogies or Approaches to teaching entropy (thermodynamics). That would be a step towards making the article more neutral. Right now there may be only one such approach written up, but others (e.g. "disorder") can be mentioned in the lead, and there can be a stub for a section on each that someone can expand. DavRosen (talk) 15:37, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Merging this article into other(s)
I've placed templates at the top of the article suggesting three articles into which I believe this material should be merged. A variant approach to teaching entropy should reflect a variant approach to the concept of entropy as reflected in the main article(s). Even if it continues to be about a "teaching approach", it can still be merged into the other article(s) as such. In the latter case, the title change suggestions and broadening of the scope of this article will apply to the scope and naming of sections or subsections within the target articles. The title change and/or scope broadening suggestions also still apply to the present article until or unless a merge occurs. DavRosen (talk) 15:43, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
 * When you add mergeto templates, it is normal to add mergefrom templates on the articles proposed as receiving the merge. The "Discuss" link also points to the talk page of the receiving articles. Both are probably not appropriate here, but the tags should be edited to direct the discussion here. I do not have time now. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  00:20, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I have altered the mergeto links so they point to a discussion here as I suggested above. However, I do not think that a merge is appropriate to any of the three articles, although there could be a mention there. I would be more in favour of moving the article to either Entropy pedagogies or Approaches to teaching entropy (thermodynamics) as suggested above, with the article then widened and improved to discuss all the notable problems with teaching entropy and how the problems have been addressed. These problems are significant and they have been noted. The energy dispersion way is particularly important for teaching chemists. -- Bduke   (Discussion)  07:14, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

I can't see any numbers or how it works
I noticed that the article doesn't include a mathematical definition of entropy as energy dispersal anything at all. Not so much as a variable, equal sign, or digit. That's a pretty convincing indictment. 84.227.234.163 (talk) 22:58, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a textbook, but is for a general audience - A new idea
Regarding the comments about not targeting students and/or beginners, I disagree. Although Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a textbook, it is also supposed to be accessible to the general reader.

From WP:NOT, specifically WP:NOTJOURNAL:

'''7. Scientific journals and research papers. A Wikipedia article should not be presented on the assumption that the reader is well versed in the topic's field. Introductory language in the lead (and also maybe the initial sections) of the article should be written in plain terms and concepts that can be understood by any literate reader of Wikipedia without any knowledge in the given field before advancing to more detailed explanations of the topic. While wikilinks should be provided for advanced terms and concepts in that field, articles should be written on the assumption that the reader will not or cannot follow these links, instead attempting to infer their meaning from the text.'''

'''8. Academic language. Texts should be written for everyday readers, not just for academics...'''

I think about half of WP doesn't follow that strict definition! However, this sociologist's idea is as follows: Could gas dispersal be given as an *example* of entropy under conditions of zero gravity, and then explain why it doesn't hold otherwise? Use it as part of an example in the main article rather than as a separate definition? Although examples are discouraged somewhere I read, in the interests of making the definiion clear to the general reader, I think it is legit. Thoughts? Peacedance (talk) 22:26, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Link
http://www.eoht.info/page/Energy+dispersal does a much better job of explaining the background of this idea than the Wiki page. It seems to me that since is really just a footnote within the main topic of "entropy", it really needs to be approached from a more historical point of view, focusing not on what entropy MEANS (we all know what it means, it is in the main article) but WHY some people would advocate a different approach, with some details on the problems this may cause with the correct interpretation of the term. Right now the whole article is written in the form of a proposal, violating Wikipedia guidelines. It needs to be rewritten and refocused in a manner similar to how the linked article is. Vree65 (talk) 00:09, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

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I can help here
As noted by one commenter above; the 'energy disposal' metaphor is especially useful in Chemistry, but has not been adopted as widely in Physics - which is my main area. I think Harvey Leff actually first wrote about 'spreading and sharing of energy' before Lambert's crusade to move Chemistry textbooks to a different metaphor more strictly thermodynamic. But Frank Lambert was highly successful at convincing the Chemistry crowd that disorderly behavior was not a suitable measure for entropy in that field. I think the 'entropy is disorder' notion has caught on because Science popularizers like Sean Carroll like the fact that the tendency toward entropy is easy to demonstrate. But I agree with Leff and Lambert that it is wrong to equate this tendency with increasing thermodynamic entropy - and I think this is true even in Physics.

I will start by crafting a new lead paragraph off-line, and possibly make a subtitle change. I will readily admit that I exchanged e-mails with Profs. Lambert and Leff on at least a few occasions discussing Physics questions. I have cited one or both in at least a few published papers, made mention in talks at conferences, and had lively discussions about their work with other physicists as well. The 'energetic dispersal' idea plays extremely well in the context of "energetic causal sets" which I had the pleasure to hear Lee Smolin lecture on at GR21 and briefly discuss after. So this article could be way more general. But people are enamored of the 'disorder' concept. In his Scientific American article; J. Miguel Rubi carefully explains that it is the continuous progression of thermodynamic entropy which creates the alternating appearance of order and disorder in the mesoscopic regime.

But the Sci Am editors featured a headline on how the 2nd law of thermo is broken - which is not what the article says at all. Go figure.

More later, Jonathan JonathanD (talk) 04:09, 26 March 2019 (UTC)