Dec 14, 2024 03:36 AM
https://www.sequencermag.com/the-second-arrow-of-time/
EXCERPT: . . . consider another vector of time, a more universal one that abides by fundamental factors of the cosmos — the elements, and the number of possible mineral combinations that they can create. Astrobiologists Michael Wong and Bob Hazen call this “the second arrow of time.”
It might help researchers better search out pockets of the universe where life might be evolving. It might even help them identify life’s nascent signatures, even if that alien life looks absolutely nothing like organic life here on Earth. Unlike the everyday 24 hour clock, which ticks on into infinity, this clock appears to be slowing down.
In October 2023, Wong and Hazen, at the Earth and Planets Laboratory of the Carnegie Institute of Sciences in Washington DC, published a paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences proposing a natural law that describes all evolving systems, both living and nonliving. Life evolves, but so do galaxies, planets, and minerals.
As a star system ages, more and more complex elements begin to form. That makes more and more elemental combinations possible. Therefore, more minerals can form. That is the same kind of evolution that lifeforms undergo. They all evolve to contain more information. This maxim, that all complex things, living and nonliving, grow and evolve, they dubbed the “law of increasing functional information.”
“This is founded on the idea that each evolving system shows selection for some kind of function, out of a very large combinatorial possibility space,” said Hazen. Everything — living systems, organisms, and nonliving systems alike, change over time to optimize something, out of a gargantuan number of choices and atomic combinations. “Trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions” Hazen said.
Stars and minerals aren’t selected for making lots of baby stars and litters of minerals, but for just any kind of advantage. Some tiny combination of minerals might perform a function, and in the early goings of the universe that function is: don’t fall apart. Don’t melt, don’t disintegrate, don’t transform into something else, don’t explode.
“There are something like 1040 possible combinations of chemical elements, and only 6000 persist stably,” said Hazen. These are the approximately 6000 “approved” minerals known to science. Many minerals on Earth, in fact, cannot even form abiotically. They require some lifeform to intercede and do some internal chemistry to produce it. According to Wong something like one third of all of Earth’s minerals are formed this way.
“There is very little difference between life and its environment, they’re constantly interdependent,” said Wong. “What would it even mean to talk about life absent everything that surrounds it?”
In a new paper published in June in PNAS Nexus, Wong and Hazen have a follow-up to their 2023 paper, which says that the increase in information in different kinds of mineral combinations, here on Earth is not only not unlimited, but is slowing down. The number of new mineral combinations that can be created here on Earth not only shrunk, but measuring how many new mineral combinations is possible can be used to study the age of star systems... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPT: . . . consider another vector of time, a more universal one that abides by fundamental factors of the cosmos — the elements, and the number of possible mineral combinations that they can create. Astrobiologists Michael Wong and Bob Hazen call this “the second arrow of time.”
It might help researchers better search out pockets of the universe where life might be evolving. It might even help them identify life’s nascent signatures, even if that alien life looks absolutely nothing like organic life here on Earth. Unlike the everyday 24 hour clock, which ticks on into infinity, this clock appears to be slowing down.
In October 2023, Wong and Hazen, at the Earth and Planets Laboratory of the Carnegie Institute of Sciences in Washington DC, published a paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences proposing a natural law that describes all evolving systems, both living and nonliving. Life evolves, but so do galaxies, planets, and minerals.
As a star system ages, more and more complex elements begin to form. That makes more and more elemental combinations possible. Therefore, more minerals can form. That is the same kind of evolution that lifeforms undergo. They all evolve to contain more information. This maxim, that all complex things, living and nonliving, grow and evolve, they dubbed the “law of increasing functional information.”
“This is founded on the idea that each evolving system shows selection for some kind of function, out of a very large combinatorial possibility space,” said Hazen. Everything — living systems, organisms, and nonliving systems alike, change over time to optimize something, out of a gargantuan number of choices and atomic combinations. “Trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions” Hazen said.
Stars and minerals aren’t selected for making lots of baby stars and litters of minerals, but for just any kind of advantage. Some tiny combination of minerals might perform a function, and in the early goings of the universe that function is: don’t fall apart. Don’t melt, don’t disintegrate, don’t transform into something else, don’t explode.
“There are something like 1040 possible combinations of chemical elements, and only 6000 persist stably,” said Hazen. These are the approximately 6000 “approved” minerals known to science. Many minerals on Earth, in fact, cannot even form abiotically. They require some lifeform to intercede and do some internal chemistry to produce it. According to Wong something like one third of all of Earth’s minerals are formed this way.
“There is very little difference between life and its environment, they’re constantly interdependent,” said Wong. “What would it even mean to talk about life absent everything that surrounds it?”
In a new paper published in June in PNAS Nexus, Wong and Hazen have a follow-up to their 2023 paper, which says that the increase in information in different kinds of mineral combinations, here on Earth is not only not unlimited, but is slowing down. The number of new mineral combinations that can be created here on Earth not only shrunk, but measuring how many new mineral combinations is possible can be used to study the age of star systems... (MORE - missing details)