Introduction to entropy: Difference between revisions

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Originally, entropy was named to describe the "waste heat" from engines and other mechanical devices. Later, the term came to acquire several additional descriptions as more came to be understood about the behavior of molecules on the microscopic level. In the late 19th century the word "disorder" was used by [[Ludwig Boltzmann]] to describe the increased molecular movement on the microscopic level. That was before quantum behavior came to be better understood by [[Werner Heisenberg]] and those who followed. For most of the 20th century textbooks tended to describe entropy as "disorder", following Boltzmann. More recently there has been a trend in chemistry and physics textbooks to describe entropy in terms of "dispersal of energy".

OtherIn some disciplines, such as chemistry, have taken entropy to also mean the dispersal of particles. Thus there are instances where both particles and energy disperse at different rates when substances are mixed together. Yet other disciplines such as information sciences have developed concepts such as [[information entropy]]. Thermodynamic (heat) entropy may also involve [[statistical mechanics]], which describes entropy on the microscopic level.

==Technical descriptions of entropy==