Uploaded July 2018 | Updated September 2026, 33 minutes ago
There has long been a debate between the Boltzmannian and Gibbsian views of statistical mechanics, and in particular their different views of entropy. Recently, however, it has been suggested that even with the Gibbsian framework, the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy is not the appropriate statistical mechanical entropy, with a revival of interest in non-extensive entropies. I will attempt to put this recent work into a broader context. First I will show that even with phenomenological thermodynamics, fluctuation phenomena and irreversibility can point to the non-uniqueness of entropy as a function of state. Then I will review an argument to uniquely identify the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy as the statistical mechanical entropy function. Finally I will show how relaxing assumptions in this argument leads to a wide family of entropy functions that naturally incorporates the non-extensive entropies and the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy as special cases.
Annual UWO Philosophy of Physics Conference
Thermodynamics as a Resource Theory: Foundational and Philosophical Implications
June 20-22, 2018
philphysics.uwo.ca
Owen Maroney, University of Oxford
Visit the Rotman website for more information on applications, events, project descriptions, and openings. rotman.uwo.ca
Follow The Rotman Institute on Twitter: twitter.com/rotmanphilo
Like The Rotman Institute on Facebook: facebook.com/rotmanphilosophy
Subscribe to our channel: youtube.com/user/rotmanphilosophy
There has long been a debate between the Boltzmannian and Gibbsian views of statistical mechanics, and in particular their different views of entropy. Recently, however, it has been suggested that even with the Gibbsian framework, the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy is not the appropriate statistical mechanical entropy, with a revival of interest in non-extensive entropies. I will attempt to put this recent work into a broader context. First I will show that even with phenomenological thermodynamics, fluctuation phenomena and irreversibility can point to the non-uniqueness of entropy as a function of state. Then I will review an argument to uniquely identify the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy as the statistical mechanical entropy function. Finally I will show how relaxing assumptions in this argument leads to a wide family of entropy functions that naturally incorporates the non-extensive entropies and the Gibbs-von Neumann entropy as special cases.
Annual UWO Philosophy of Physics Conference
Thermodynamics as a Resource Theory: Foundational and Philosophical Implications
June 20-22, 2018
philphysics.uwo.ca
Owen Maroney, University of Oxford
Visit the Rotman website for more information on applications, events, project descriptions, and openings. rotman.uwo.ca
Follow The Rotman Institute on Twitter: twitter.com/rotmanphilo
Like The Rotman Institute on Facebook: facebook.com/rotmanphilosophy
Subscribe to our channel: youtube.com/user/rotmanphilosophy
