Entropy Books

Entropy Demystified: The Second Law Reduced to Plain Common Sense

Arieh Ben-Naim

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Basic 3 out of 5 stars.
31 of 34 people found this review helpful.

After seeing nothing but five-star reviews for this book, I figured I'd pick it up despite having little feel for what its target audience was since none of it was actually viewable on Amazon.

In a nutshell, this is very much a book for laymen. If you want an intuitive grasp of what entropy's about in the context of everyday physics without getting bogged down in math, then this may be a great book for you. The book uses as little math as possible in its explanations, and effectively assumes you're unfamiliar with or have forgotten high-school-level math operations such as factorials and logarithms. It manages to pound its point home reasonably well using lots and lots of fairly simple thought experiments that only differ from each other by little incremental steps.

On the other hand, if you already know anything at all about the information-theoretic formulation of entropy, already have an appreciation for the Law of Large Numbers, and have heard the words "macrostates" and "microstates" before, then there's nothing in this book you aren't likely to understand already. If you've taken a course on statistical mechanics and finished it without being horrendously confused, but maybe were hoping for a useful refresher on how different formulations of entropy are related, you should pass on this book. If you were hoping for illumination about the aspects of entropy that are actually at all "interesting" to modern physicists, such as black hole entropy (or the bizarre theories it's spawned such as the holographic principle), this is definitely not the book you're looking for.

Also, the book has no index. This is less annoying than it would be in a book that had more meat to it, but still, any 200+ page nonfiction book with no index should be taken out and shot as a matter of principle.

Editorial Review:

In this unique book, Arieh Ben-Naim invites the reader to experience the joy of appreciating something which has eluded understanding for many years entropy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The book has a two-pronged message: first, that the Second Law is not infinitely incomprehensible as commonly stated in textbooks of thermodynamics but can, in fact, be comprehended through sheer common sense; and second, that entropy is not a mysterious quantity that has resisted understanding but a simple, familiar and easily comprehensible concept. Written in an accessible style, the book guides the reader through an abundance of dice games and examples from everyday life. The author paves the way for readers to discover for themselves what entropy is, how it changes, and most importantly, why it always changes in one direction in a spontaneous process.

Data Analysis: A Bayesian Tutorial

Devinderjit Sivia, John Skilling

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Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Statistics lectures have been a source of much bewilderment and frustration for generations of students. This book attempts to remedy the situation by expounding a logical and unified approach to the whole subject of data analysis.
This text is intended as a tutorial guide for senior undergraduates and research students in science and engineering. After explaining the basic principles of Bayesian probability theory, their use is illustrated with a variety of examples ranging from elementary parameter estimation to image processing. Other topics covered include reliability analysis, multivariate optimization, least-squares and maximum likelihood, error-propagation, hypothesis testing, maximum entropy and experimental design.
The Second Edition of this successful tutorial book contains a new chapter on extensions to the ubiquitous least-squares procedure, allowing for the straightforward handling of outliers and unknown correlated noise, and a cutting-edge contribution from John Skilling on a novel numerical technique for Bayesian computation called 'nested sampling'.

Entropy

Jeremy Rifkin

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Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

His doomsday is here and we did not listen 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Rifkin's ideas about physics may or may not be on solid ground, but he's predicted many apocalyptic realities with regard to the environment. And for this we must give him much credit. We have to remember. This book was written going on thirty years ago, before our era of manifest global warming. He predicted a warming of the planet. He doesn't call it "peek oil," as it's called today, but this is what he warns us about way back when.

His theory that the so-called Middle Ages ended with the advent of coal as a fuel source is intriguing. It sounds plausible to me. The way we get energy must have a lot to do with the way society is structured. We can certainly say this about agriculture. Once man began cultivating land, the concept of wealth was created, no less...

But back to the many predictions Rifkin made in this book: He warned these many years ago about the dangers of synthetic petrochemical nitrogen fertilizers choking our waters. Imagine that! No one was talking about that then and not even now. The Clean Water Act of 1972 does not address toxic runoff from farms and until that legislation is amended, our waters will be polluted. All over the world, runoff is truly one of the greatest environmental threats; we know this now for certain.

Rifkin, back then, long before the rest of us, was writing about the junk thrown in the oceans. Today we have a whirlpool of the size of Greenland over Midway Island densely clogged with plastic refuse, suffocating and starving out wildlife there.

Some environmentalists today (too, too few) are lamenting the advent of the flushing toilet. Rifkin does not point this out specifically, but he does note how our coasts were, even back then, poisoned by sewage.

The discord among nations today is all about oil, water, land, and natural resources of all sorts. Do we dare admit? This is one of Rifkin's main themes and rightly so. G. W. Bush can say we went into Iraq to bring that country democracy, but we all know, it was about oil.

They say today that if everyone on Earth lived as we do in the USA, the world would require the natural resources of five planet Earths. Rifkin alluded to this fact in this book and so long ago. Amazing.

It's taken me years of reading the environmental literature to discover the above information. And I could have found it all in this book decades ago.

There's lots more; I can't note it all. How 'bout, just read the book.

Introductory Statistical Mechanics

Roger Bowley, Mariana Sanchez

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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Great introduction to statistical mechanics 4 out of 5 stars.
11 of 11 people found this review helpful.

I recommend this book to anyone who is taking an undergraduate course in stat mech. I also recommend it to beginning GRADUATE students of stat mech. I used it for my own graduate coursework and I found it to be extremely helpful.

This book provides a clean, uncluttered presentation of the principles of stat mech; does not lose sight of the physical reasons behind the mathematical manipulations; and most helpful of all, contains a good set of problems WITH SOLUTIONS! It has been more helpful to me in my graduate work than any graduate-level book!

In a next edition, maybe the authors can include a gentle introduction to the new renormalization group theory of phase transitions, and also increase the number and depth of problems.

If you plan on studying stat mech, get this book.

Editorial Review:

This book explains the ideas and techniques of statistical mechanics in a simple and progressive way, accessible to undergraduates. It includes numerous examples from solid state physics as well as from theories of radiation from black holes and data from the Cosmic Background Explorer. This second edition features three new chapters on phase transitions and additional exercises at the end of each chapter.

Chance: The Life of Games & the Game of Life

Joaquim P. Marques de Sá

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Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Well written, intuitive and enjoyable book 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This book gives a delightful overview of Probability, that is, Chance, as a phenomenon in both games and life. The writing style is clear and engaging. Concepts of probability theory are presented in a way that helps the reader realize why we would want to understand these ideas. As a mathematician who teaches probability and statistics courses from time to time, I found this book to be filled with examples that I will use in class the next time I teach Probability. When the author uses the usual examples of flipping coins, rolling dice, and drawing balls from an urn, he makes it clear how these probability experiments can be used to model real life.

In ten chapters, this book presents an intuitive overview of the theory of probability, including both the classical notion of probability, and use of relative frequencies to estimate probabilities. There are chapters on conditional probability (Amazing Conditions), mathematical expectation (Expecting to Win), the normal and binomial distributions, and the law of large numbers (The Wonderful Curve), inference (Probable Inferences), chance and determinism (The Nature of Chance), and sequences and random processes (Noisy Irregularities). Games of chance that are played in casinos (roulette, craps, card games, slot machines) and state-sponsored lottery games are introduced early, and recur throughout the book as examples that bring light to concepts that can be difficult to explain. These games form the backdrop for explaining mathematical expectation; after all, a casino does not stay in business unless the House is winning in the long run. The author consistently connects these examples to probabilities that I care about in daily life, such as the probability of having cancer given the outcome of a screening test. My students are likely to enjoy the last chapter, Living with Chance, in which the author discusses Learning, in Spite of Chance, and proves that there are circumstances in which learning is impossible.

The author keeps the mathematical prerequisites to a minimum, so that this book would be accessible to an undergraduate who has completed Calculus. In fact, no calculus is used in this book, but an undergraduate who has completed calculus would have the mathematical maturity to read (and enjoy!) this book. The author provides appendices on Powers, the Exponential Function, the Logarithmic Function, the Factorial Function, Sinusoids, and the Binary Number System for those students who need a review (or even a basic introduction) to these topics. Although this is not a textbook (for one thing, there are no exercises), I would consider using it as a text for a student who wanted to do an independent study of probability theory.

Apparently this book was first written in Portuguese, but no translator is given. I surmise then that the author himself is the translator. The back cover note mentions that the author has written "four books in Portuguese and three in English." I mention this because this book does not read like a translation; the author-translator gives an excellent presentation of this material, and one is not distracted by awkward phrases that sometimes appear in material that has been translated from another language. This book reads as if it were originally written in English.

Editorial Review:

With its many easy-to-follow mathematical examples, this book takes the reader on an almost chronological trip through the fascinating and amazing laws of chance, omnipresent in the natural world and in our daily lives. Along the route many fascinating topics are discussed, such as: challenging probability paradoxes; "paranormal" coincidences; game odds; causes and effects; interpretation of opinion polls; winning chances as a game proceeds; the nature of randomness; entropy and randomness; randomness in life; algorithmic complexity and the undecidability of randomness; possibilities and limitations of learning the laws of a Universe immersed in chance events. This charming book will inform and entertain the scientist and non-scientist alike.

Entropy and the Time Evolution of Macroscopic Systems (International Series of Monographs on Physics)

Jr., Walter T. Grandy

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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

This book is based on the premise that the entropy concept, a fundamental element of probability theory as logic, governs all of thermal physics, both equilibrium and nonequilibrium. The variational algorithm of J. Willard Gibbs, dating from the 19th Century and extended considerably over the following 100 years, is shown to be the governing feature over the entire range of thermal phenomena, such that only the nature of the macroscopic constraints changes. Beginning with a short history of the development of the entropy concept by Rudolph Clausius and his predecessors, along with the formalization of classical thermodynamics by Gibbs, the first part of the book describes the quest to uncover the meaning of thermodynamic entropy, which leads to its relationship with probability and information as first envisioned by Ludwig Boltzmann. Recognition of entropy first of all as a fundamental element of probability theory in mid-twentieth Century led to deep insights into both statistical mechanics and thermodynamics, the details of which are presented here in several chapters. The later chapters extend these ideas to nonequilibrium statistical mechanics in an unambiguous manner, thereby exhibiting the overall unifying role of the entropy.

Non-equilibrium Thermodynamics and the Production of Entropy: Life, Earth, and Beyond (Understanding Complex Systems)

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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

if you want to understand how Gaia works. 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

I saw this book reviewed in Nature magazine. It had a rave review there, so I bought a copy. I wasn't dissapointed, this is a reprint of all the seminal papers on the subject of MEP (Maximum Entropy Production). It is a modern version of Schroedinger's famous book - "What is Life".

My only wish is that the book could be a little MORE mathematically complete.

Editorial Review:

The present volume studies the application of concepts from non-equilibrium thermodynamics to a variety of research topics. Emphasis is on the Maximum Entropy Production (MEP) principle and applications to Geosphere-Biosphere couplings. Written by leading researchers from a wide range of backgrounds, the book presents a first coherent account of an emerging field at the interface of thermodynamics, geophysics and life sciences.

The Refrigerator and the Universe: Understanding the Laws of Energy

Martin Goldstein, Inge F. Goldstein

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Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

C. P. Snow once remarked that not knowing the second law of thermodynamics is like never having read Shakespeare. Yet, while many people grasp the first law of energy, "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed," few recognize the second, "Entropy can only increase." What is entropy anyway, and why must it increase? Whether we want to know how a device as simple as a refrigerator works or understand the fate of the universe, we must start with the concepts of energy and entropy. In The Refrigerator and the Universe, Martin and Inge Goldstein explain the laws of thermodynamics for science buffs and neophytes alike. They begin with a lively presentation of the historical development of thermodynamics. The authors then show how the laws follow from the atomic theory of matter and give examples of their applicability to such diverse phenomena as the radiation of light from hot bodies, the formation of diamonds from graphite, how the blood carries oxygen, and the history of the earth. The laws of energy, the Goldsteins conclude, have something to say about everything, even if they do not tell us everything about anything.

In The Refrigerator and the Universe, Martin and Inge Goldstein explain the laws of thermodynamics for science buffs and neophytes alike. They begin with a lively presentation of the historical development of thermodynamics. The authors then show how the laws follow from the atomic theory of matter and give examples of their applicability to such diverse phenomena as the radiation of light from hot bodies, the formation of diamonds from graphite, how the blood carries oxygen, and the history of the earth. The laws of energy, the Goldsteins conclude, have something to say about everything, even if they do not tell us everything about anything.

Complexity, Entropy and the Physics of Information

Wojciech H. Zurek

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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Masterful. Just plain masterful. 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 32 people found this review helpful.

A must have for those with a deep commitment to the second law of thermodynamics, entropy, and information theory. Let us give thanks to Jonny von Naumann.

Editorial Review:

This book explores not only the connections between quantum and classical physics, information and its transfer, computation, and their significance for the formulation of physical theories, but it also considers the origins evolution of the information-processing entities, their complexity, and the manner in which they analyze their perceptions to form models of the Universe.

Information and Self-Organization: A Macroscopic Approach to Complex Systems (Springer Series in Synergetics)

Hermann Haken

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Editorial Review:

This book presents the concepts needed to deal with self-organizing complex systems from a unifying point of view that uses macroscopic data. The various meanings of the concept "information" are discussed and a general formulation of the maximum information (entropy) principle is used. With the aid of results from synergetics, adequate objective constraints for a large class of self-organizing systems are formulated and examples are given from physics, life and computer science. The relationship to chaos theory is examined and it is further shown that, based on possibly scarce and noisy data, unbiased guesses about processes of complex systems can be made and the underlying deterministic and random forces determined. This allows for probabilistic predictions of processes, with applications to numerous fields in science, technology, medicine and economics. The extensions of the third edition are essentially devoted to an introduction to the meaning of information in the quantum context. Indeed, quantum information science and technology is presently one of the most active fields of research at the interface of physics, technology and information sciences and has already established itself as one of the major future technologies for processing and communicating information on any scale.

This book addresses graduate students and nonspecialist researchers wishing to get acquainted with the concept of information from a scientific perspective in more depth. It is suitable as a textbook for advanced courses or for self-study.