II. DISSIPATIVE STRUCTURES

The physical chemist Illya Prigogine (1980) was one of the first to demonstrate the thermodynamic and chemical benefits of non-equilibrium by showing that non-equilibrium configurations of low entropy and great complexity can be stabilized if they are open to the inward and outward flow of energy and matter. Prigogine and his colleagues (Prigogine 1980; Nicolis and Prigogine 1989; Jantsch 1980) call these stable systems dissipative structures and argue that they may spontaneously develop great c omplexity, coherent behavior, and become reservoirs of considerable information.

The pathway to the formation of stable dissipative structures involves a condition of metastability in which non-linear processes amplify small fluctuations so that they can have influences far beyond themselves. As a result of such non-linearity, the system can suddenly transform into something radically different, similar to rapid phase transitions from a supersaturated liquid to ice. In the metastable state just prior to transformation, the future system may be entirely unknowable. Order and complex ity in the dissipative structure are created from disorder precisely because the system is out of equilibrium and dominated by non-linear processes. We humans should feel comfortable by the ideas of self-organized complexity and dissipative systems for we are the ultimate improbable structures in our cosmic neighborhood.

In order to achieve a decrease in entropy, the system needs to be open and dissipate "low quality" energy into its surroundings. A chicken egg is able to develop internal complexity by dissipating heat to the outside. Preventing dissipation by surroun ding the egg with an insulating layer would kill its contents. Likewise enclosing the inner part of the solar system by an insulating shell and thereby preventing dissipation of "low quality" energy into inter-planetary space would eventually destroy life on our planet. The de-coupling of an internal combustion engine from its radiator will similarly kill the engine.