The history of life on Earth shows a trend towards greater complexity, functionality, and diversity, in stark contrast to the general trend of nature. What are evolutionists to do when their theory runs afoul of the laws of nature? Why, propose a bold new law of nature! Trouble lies in store, however, for their brave venture.

Science writer Philip Ball summarizes a new research idea in his article for Quanta Magazine, “Why Everything in the Universe Turns More Complex.”

A fundamental flaw in reasoning seems to have led the researchers to a fundamentally flawed proposal. A worldview or philosophical basis can be judged based on how well or how poorly its axioms correspond with reality. The presuppositions leading to this proposed new law are voiced by one researcher, a mineralogist:

“I concluded that talking about life versus nonlife is a false dichotomy,” [Robert] Hazen said. “I felt there had to be some kind of continuum — there has to be something that’s driving this process from simpler to more complex systems.”

A Fundamental Difference 

If a student of nature fails to discern a fundamental difference between living organisms and non-living matter, it follows that he might be likely to propose ideas that run counter to established science.

An interdisciplinary team of researchers “have proposed nothing less than a new law of nature, according to which the complexity of entities in the universe increases over time with an inexorability comparable to the second law of thermodynamics.”

It’s ironic that they liken the effect of their proposed new law to the “inexorability” of the second law of thermodynamics, since this law shipwrecks their bold notion before it even gets off the ground. Other scientists have also questioned the proposal.

[The new] hypothesis, formulated by … Hazen and the astrobiologist Michael Wong of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, D.C., along with a team of others, has provoked intense debate.

And well it ought to! Their hypothesis attempts to steer a course of nature in opposition to the second law. If any law of physics is regarded as inviolable and fundamental to our universe, it is the law of increasing entropy described as the second law of thermodynamics. The prominent 20th-century British astronomer and physicist Sir Arthur Eddington has remarked:

If your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation.

A Classic Case

Hazen and Wong claim their new proposal for the “inexorable” increase of functional complexity finds a way around the second law. Says Hazen:

“But it seems like there’s a much more idiosyncratic pathway that the universe takes. We think it’s because of selection for function — a very orderly process that leads to ordered states.”

They seem to have stumbled into a classic case of confusion between case in point and case under investigation. Rather than realizing the implausibility of sudden natural increases in the functional complexity of living systems, as seen in the historical appearance of eukaryotic cells and the Cambrian explosion, they point to these as “Exhibit A” in support of their new theory.

However, the second law can’t be circumvented by any arrangement of intermediate steps, nor by the invention of a new law of nature. The unmentioned but devastating problem with their proposal is just that the second law prohibits the outcome that their proposal requires — functionally complex systems. Neither evolution, nor their proposed new law can generate information-rich functionality, and they can’t select what doesn’t exist.

Vain and Naïve

To champion this proposal with the jibe that “the basic laws of physics are not ‘complete’” is a vain and naïve hope. The naïveté lies in mistaking the incompleteness of our physical understanding of every aspect of nature (a valid statement) to mean that nature can violate its laws in ways that are already understood (a mistaken notion of nature).

To make my point clearer, consider two examples from discoveries in physics over the last century. The first relates to the introduction of Einstein’s special theory of relativity in 1905. His new theory predicted several remarkable phenomena that substantially departed from classical Newtonian physics, which had guided our understanding of mechanics for more than two centuries.

Another example arose from the theory of quantum mechanics, developed in the first few decades of the 20th century. Quantum theory completely overturned the concept of a fundamental particle, such as an electron, being a small, solid bit of matter. Particles actually behave like waves and not just lumps of mass. Energy and momentum states of confined particles exhibit quantization or discrete values, rather than the classically expected continuum of possible values.

A Surface Acquaintance

A person having a surface acquaintance with science might use these examples to bolster the notion that scientific “truths” are mere placeholders until the next bright idea comes along. But that’s not the way it actually works. Any new proposal for a law of physics cannot contradict previously established laws in their realms of tested applicability.

Einstein’s theory of relativity only noticeably modified Newton’s laws of motion in the extreme instance of a relative velocity approaching the speed of light, for example, in high-energy particle accelerators. Every new formula in Einstein’s theory that modifies familiar physics concepts, like the kinetic energy of a moving object, mathematically reduces to the old Newtonian formula when the velocity is small compared to the speed of light.  

Einstein’s new formulae are superfluous for the motion of everyday objects. Even the fastest space probe ever made moves so slowly compared to light that relativistic effects for its motion amount to less than one part in a million. So, it’s no wonder that Newton’s laws of motion are still applicable for all but the most exacting calculations of macroscopic motion.

Similarly, the radical quantum behavior of fundamental particles only manifests in the realm of the extremely small. Quantum effects in the macroscopic realm where we live are utterly unnoticeable. So, neither relativity nor quantum theory proved Newton “wrong.” These theories of modern physics only addressed new phenomena that show up in the “frontier land” beyond the limits of everyday observations. One could use relativistic mechanics to calculate the trajectory of a satellite in orbit around the Earth, but it would be unnecessary and mathematically cumbersome, and it would only yield solutions that are practically indistinguishable from “good old” Newtonian mechanics.

A Careless Misunderstanding

The proposal of a law of increasing functional complexity as a universal law of nature doesn’t just modify the fundamental second law of thermodynamics in some unexplored niche of extreme parameter space. It purports to upend the essential dictates of mainstream science. Rather than deserving applause as a brave new proposal in support of evolutionary theory, such an idea serves only as an example of a careless misunderstanding of reality and the nature of the scientific enterprise.

The one notable contribution these researchers make, however, is to draw attention to the fact that living systems represent quantum jumps in the increase of functional complexity. Science has already shown that nature is incapable of bringing this about without an intelligent mind serving as the source of the information associated with increasing specified complexity. A straightforward application of logic suggests that if nature can’t produce life, and yet life abounds on Earth, then a source transcending nature produced the proliferation of life we uniquely find on Earth. And there’s a proposal that doesn’t conflict with any established law of physics.