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Some Critical Remarks Concerning Prigogine's Conception of Temporal Irreversibility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Guido Verstraeten
Guido Verstraeten*
Affiliation:
Centrum voor Logika Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and Department of Physics Chancellor College University of Malawi
*
‡Send reprint requests to the author, Hoger Instituut voor Wijsbegeerte, Centrum voor Logika, K. U. Leuven, Kardinaal Mercierplein 2, B-3000 Leuven, BELGIUM.
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Abstract

The concept underlying Prigogine's ideas is the asymmetric “lifetime” he introduces into thermodynamics in addition to the symmetric time parameter. By identifying processes by means of causal chains of genidentical events, we examine the intrinsic order of lifetime adopting Grünbaum's symmetric time order. Further, we define the physical meaning and the actuality of the processes under consideration. We conclude that Prigogine's microscopic temporal irreversibility is tacitly assumed at macroscopic level. Moreover, his “new” complementarity lacks any scientific foundation. Finally, we put forward the fact-like origin of temporal irreversibility referring to classical thermodynamics.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 58 , Issue 4 , December 1991 , pp. 639 - 654
Copyright
Copyright © 1991 The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

We wish to thank Professor H. Roelants for his constructive remarks. We also thank the Nationaal Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek for financial support.

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