Dynamics of membrane processes

Abstract

I. I. In his illuminating book onThe Nature of Thermodynamics, Bridgeman (1941) points out an intrinsic contradiction between the concepts of physical and biological evolution. In his words: ‘The view that the universe is running down into a condition where its entropy and the amount of disorder are as great as possible has had a profound effect on the views of many biologists on the nature of biological phenomena. It springs to the eye, however, that the tendency of living organisms is to organize their surroundings—that is to “produce” order where formerly there was disorder. Life then appears in some way to oppose the otherwise universal drive to disorder. Does it mean that living organisms do, or may violate the second law of thermodynamics?…’