Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

Shuizid t1_itw2epq wrote

Reply to comment by yemiz23 in [Image] Just a reminder for everyone who might feel insignificant by drbrydges

Our intelligence itself isn't really impacting the overall entropy growth - because what we consume for it would be consumed by others anyway.

We do however burn fossil fuels - which were in a stable environment for millions of years.

1

yemiz23 t1_itwo3am wrote

Not our intelligence but intelligence as a whole. It consumes far more energy than not and if conditions are right the creature tend to dominate their environment. For example, Corvid are one of the most abundant birds, Orcas and blue whale rule the oceans and the less said about man the better. Essentially intelligence always consumes more energy thus more entropy. However, I am willing to be wrong and if it doesn’t lead to more entropy than other forms of life I am willing to accept this. I don’t think a study has been done on this so it’s just my hypothesis.

1

Shuizid t1_iu1ft8f wrote

Intelligence helps dominate - but my assumption is that evolution will fill any niche of available resources. While intelligent organisms consume more per individual, they also replace a lot of smaller organisms who could have done the same.

Thus entropy can only be increased faster, by increasing the available resources -> like digging up fossil fuels.

That said, given "entropy" is a pretty vague term and biology is just insanely complex, I aswell cannot definitivly say intelligence itself doesn't increase entropy. I wouldn't even know how to design a study, so I certainly cannot claim my assumption would be correct.

2