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Entropy is the tendency for objects, when left to their own devices, to orient themselves in a random manner. As a great man once pointed out, ever notice how easy it is for the back seat of your car to get messy? Entropy at work. Entropy is the phenomenon we witness all around us in the physical universe. However it seems that eventually, entropy produces life, which is a self-organizing system which tends to become more and more complex – eg, you and me. So it could be that entropy is actually organised at some deep level. A bit like chaos theory and emergent behaviour – you start off with a random mess, but after a while, certain patterns start to appear in the randomness. No, I don't understand it either. You should read »Frontiers of Complexity« by a couple of really clever guys – it's much better. Incidentally I acquired that book by a random method – a bookstore in my town was closing down and selling every book for £1. And I mean everything – little paperbacks to murderously big coffee-table books, all £1. But I was about to get on a train so I'd have to carry everything I bought halfway across the country in a holdall and back. So I bought 5 books, and one of them was that one. We seem to have drifted away from the subject here somewhat... it must be entropy at work in my mind.
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