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Reconsidering the Concept of Equilibrium in Classical Statistical Mechanics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Janneke van Lith
Janneke van Lith*
Affiliation:
Utrecht University
*
†lnstitute for History and Foundations of Mathematics and Science, Utrecht University, P.O. Box 80000, 3508 TA Utrecht, The Netherlands; e-mail: [email protected].
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Abstract

In the usual procedure of deriving equilibrium thermodynamics from classical statistical mechanics, Gibbsian fine-grained entropy is taken as the analogue of thermodynamical entropy. However, it is well known that the fine-grained entropy remains constant under the Hamiltonian flow. In this paper it is argued that we need not search for alternatives for fine-grained entropy, nor do we have to reject Hamiltonian dynamics, in order to solve the problem of the constancy of fine-grained entropy and, more generally, to account for the non-equilibrium part of the laws of thermodynamics. Rather, we have to weaken the requirement that equilibrium be identified with a stationary probability distribution.

Type
Foundations of Statistical Physics, Spacetime Theories, and Quantum Field Theory
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 66 , Issue S3: Supplement. Proceedings of the 1998 Biennial Meetings of the Philosophy of Science Association. Part I: Contributed Papers Sep., 1999 , 1999 , pp. S107 - S118
Copyright
Copyright © 1999 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

I would like to thank Dennis Dieks and Jos Uffink for valuable comments on earlier versions of this paper.

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