Entropy in a Social Science Context

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-2007

Department

School of Business

Abstract

The paper will give an overview of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, entropy, and relative entropy. There will be a listing of areas where the latter two concepts are being employed today. The principle discussion will be in terms of the social sciences. The author will give brief examples drawn from prior research in economics. However, the emphasis will be on the research technique employed. The hope is that others will be motivated to try the technique in their endeavors. Entropy is a concept that is drawn from physics. In recent years, the notion has been applied to other areas, including most of the social sciences. Starting about 25 to 30 years ago, some economic research was done to employ this concept. Since that time, there has been a smattering of articles in economics. Nevertheless, in the opinion of the current author, the concept is not well understood. This paper has two purposes: (1) to educate more people on the concept, as applied in the social sciences (2) to question an interpretation of the concept as employed in another piece of research, done by a different author. In equilibrium, energy tends to flow spontaneously from being concentrated to becoming spread out. The word tends implies that the energy can remain concentrated for long periods of time. The second law says nothing about when or how much. The word spontaneously means that only the energy in the closed system is available; outside energy can impact the operation of the second law. In other words, equilibrium corresponds to a disordered distribution of the sets. This is not always true when the sets are influenced by extreme forces. The word equilibrium implies an end state. Some scientists believe that the second law of thermodynamics does not apply to living organisms. Although, hindering the law is necessary for us to be alive. The second law of thermodynamics is frequently referred to as “time’s arrow”. It points to how we think time goes. This implies that it is what we have seen and, more importantly for us, in this paper what we think is going to happen. Entropy in a closed system must remain constant or increase. The notion of entropy is being employed today in the fields of psychology, sociology, engineering, mathematics, statistics, economics, and information theory. The use of the word in this paper will be drawn from psychology, economics and information theory. Some would suggest that thermodynamic entropy and information theory entropy are not the same concepts. However, they are related in that both measure randomness.

First Page

38

Last Page

43

Volume

12

Issue

1

ISSN

15407780

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