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The problem with the tree and the fetus is that they do what they do because they are programmed to do what they do (just like a computer program is programmed by a coder, and not random bits)

This programming is in their DNA.

They do what is in their genetic code, which is why we can predict what they will do - a fetus will grow inside it's mother and develop in a very predictable fashion, so predictable that when it doesn't - we know something is wrong.

If you wish to say evolution happens because it was programmed to, then you have intelligent design. If evolution hasn't been programmed to, then you have random chance occurrence - like my examples where mutations are caused by a radiation blast or homone injection.

While we certainly have demonstrated in lower life forms that the gene pool is able to adapt to produce a higher survival rate in a different environment, that isn't an increase in complexity. That isn't going from a mouse to a giraffe, rarely does speciation occur - and when it does, wether it actually is speciation is highly debatable.

To make it clear, here's what you had above:

Sure, entropy allows for increased order in a part of the universe, but the sum of the universe has to decrease in order (increase in entropy). Apply that biology - and what you have is an increase in order as the norm, not as the exception.

I really hope you failed your "advanced" physics class if you are gonna offer poop like that up.  If you really did understand what the hell you were talking about, you would not say such crap.

Top of class if it matters to you - through all three semesters of lower division physics.

Well then you should be able to tell me why the second law of thermo has no applicability to earth, right?

Which is why I said "apply the concept" and not "apply the law"
The concept demonstrates itself far beyond thermodynamics - I need to see a demonstration of the concept failing before I can accept that the concept does not apply.

When we shoot radiation at emvryos to intentionally cause mutation, we see increase in entropy - and lower survival rate.

When biologists/breeders inject hormones into frogs to breed them - we see higher deformity rates, we see lower survival rates.

This is all demonstration of the concept of entropy in the field of biology - and I have never seen a demonstration of the opposite, where order increases.

Sure - we can get rid of cancer sometimes with radiation - but that's by killing the cells, an increase in entropy.

Where can you show me that the concept does not hold true in biology?

The part in bold was what those examples were all about.  Do you grant now that the concept of entropy should not be used in a debate about evolution?

What does any of that have to do with entropy?  Nothing?  Good, cuz it doesn't but you seemed to think that is did, which is what all that harping was about.  You claimed that the "concept of entropy" showed that life could only devolve.  I was using those to show that life is not bounded by the 2nd law.  Follow that?

I don't think you comprehend what I mean by apply the concept to a non thermodynamic scenario.

Let me try a basic one.
If you have 10 pennies - there are several different states they can be in.

10 heads and 0 tails
9 heads and 1 tail
8 heads and 2 tail
etc.

There is only one way to get 10 heads - it is a highly ordered state.
There are 10 ways to get 9 heads and 1 tail - it is still highly ordered.

As entropy predicts - when you penny flip experiments, and you let randomness have it's way - you most often will get 4 heads, 5 heads, or 6 heads. These are the most disordered state. A random flip is where entropy applies - there is not outside interference.

Now - I could have a machine that takes random pennies and sets them all heads up. Is that breaking entropy? No, because the machine is programmed to take a specific action - it is not a random byproduct of the machines operation. It creates 10 heads by design.

Similarly, you can program a machine that reduces the entropy of a gas in a jar - a simple heat pump will do it. This does not mean that entropy fails, only that there was design to reduce it. The gas isn't acting in random fashion.

Similarly, while a tree from the time it sproute until it is a beautiful display - it does take raw materials and use them to create an ordered structure. However - like my penny machine, like the heat pump, it does it by design - what it's genetic code has programmed it to do, it is not a random scenario.

Do you understand what I am saying?

Now - lets look at what evolution says - species going from less complex to more complex. Either it has to be by design, as the the penny machine, heat pump, and tree is - or it is a random occurence.

Which is it?
If it is random, then your tree analogy fails because the tree does what it does by design.

If it is by design, then there is a designer.

Well, earlier you were trying to apply the complexity of life as a violation of increasing entropy idea. If I understood you correctly, you were stating that the evolution of species violates entropy because they are getting increasingly ordered.

But there is a mechanism at work here as well: reproduction. When mutation occurs, an unfavorable mutation (arguably the most likely mutation) will also likely leave mutatee unable to breed and pass along his genes. Favorable mutations are perpetuated more often than unfavorable ones and allows for evolution to occur.

(Of course your penny machine example violates the first principle of entropy, as does the Earth and life itself: it must be a closed system.)

Well, resedit, you obviously don't understand entropy or when the 2nd law applies.

Well, resedit, you obviously don't understand entropy or when the 2nd law applies.

No.
You can rationalize why evolution is a case where systems become more ordered all you want - but the bottom line is that until you can demonstrate a system become more ordered without being guided to have that increase, I don't buy it.

And of course, you can't use evolution as an example of a system become more complex and more ordered, as that would be circular - since we have never witnessed the evolutionary process produce an organism that is more complex/ordered than it's parent gene pool.

Ok, let me spell this out very clearly.  The calculation of entropy has no value for intentionality.  Just because it is "supposed" to do a specific thing does not matter when calculating the entropy of a system.  You are wrong.

Edit: do you want me to actually do the entropy calculations?

It should also be noted that your tree example actually does have an increase in entropy - much of which actually occurs within the sun which provides the needed energy for the tree to take the raw materials and follow it's design.

Actually, resedit, can you give the real definition of entropy and the second law?  I'm curious as you seem to have no idea what it means and why specifically things are different in closed and open systems.

It should also be noted that your tree example actually does have an increase in entropy - much of which actually occurs within the sun which provides the needed energy for the tree to take the raw materials and follow it's design.

No poop, sherlock.  And if you make the box large enough s.t. you reach a closed system, yes, the second law is conserved.

But your example requires the energy of the sun for it to take place.
You therefore can not ignore it, otherwise you are taking a system and allowing an outside entity to act on the system, and claiming a net decrease in entropy.