SPECIAL SEMINAR

"THE ESSENCE OF TIME"

by Prof Enzo Tiezzi

Professor Enzo Tiezzi, Professor of Physico-Chemistry at the University of Siena, recently presented a special lecture on "The Essence of Time" at the Wessex Institute of Technology.

Carlos introduced Enzo stressing his pioneering work on Sustainable Development and Ecological Problems, with over 20 years of research in the area. He has participated in many conferences and projects all over the world and is Co-Chairman of the forthcoming ECOSUD Conference, which will take place in Siena from 4-6 June 2003.

WIT Press will be launching two of Tiezzi's books in their first English edition shortly at a special meeting to be held at the Italian Cultural Institute in London. They are called "The Essence of Time" and "The End of Time".

Enzo explained that with the ever-accelerating pace of life, the modern age seems to demand that science too should respond at speed. He highlighted the need for continuity between the physical-mathematical and humanistic sciences. He pointed out the need to reflect on the "tempo" of the modern era, and to contrast it with the brilliance and complexity of the human relationship with the living world.

The key scientific idea of our time is to relate ecology and economy with the law of thermodynamics, and those which illuminate our understanding of the relationship of man with our planet. This ought to result, in Enzo's opinion, in an exploration of scientific depth and a historical survey of the ideas behind ecological economics.

The maintenance of life, stressed Tiezzi requires a complex relationship between many different systems. It is tempting to separate the parts and analyse them as independent systems but this is a simplified version of the world.

Evolutionary systems combine chance with selection. These concepts were discovered by The Nobel Prize Prigogine, whose work is discussed in detail in a chapter of one of Tiezzi's books. Our life is not governed by constant and deterministic laws but by memories of the past and stochastic concepts. Science has given too much importance to space, ignoring time although the role of time is fundamental in human evolution.

These concepts are related to sustainable development as during evolution, our environment keeps changing. This leads to the idea of bio-diversity which is at the core of sustainability.

Far from equilibrium, Tiezzi said, we find new states of matter having properties sharply at variance with those corresponding to an equilibrium state. This suggests that irreversibility plays a fundamental part in nature although it is a concept not usually accepted in classical sciences.

Prigogine stated that our classical laws of nature are deterministic and reversible. The concept of entropy, however, describes an evolutionary view of nature but energy and matter are reversible and conservable, while entropy is evolutionary. The question still unanswered is if energy and mass are conservative but entropy is evolutionary, how can entropy be calculated from energy and mass?

Information and energy are not directly related. To kill the last 'caterpillar' of a species requires the same amount of energy as to kill any other caterpillar but the amount of information lost cannot be compared.

There is a lack of correlation between sciences like Darwin's which deal with evolution and others like physics which are not concerned with it.

Tiezzi refers to the concept of time by Einstein that is related to the speed of light. The well-known paradox of the twins arises from this, ie depending on the velocity of travel, one of the twins will remain younger than the other. The flaw of this argument, however, is that Einstein uses the standard velocity definition of a time derivative of space. In Tiezzi's opinion, the problem with this argument is that we cannot apply these concepts to living organisms which can change on their own. This goes back to the concept that space is renewable, while time is irreversible. The famous paradox of the twins does not exist in Tiezzi's opinion, as living organisms will not obey the same rules.

Prof Tiezzi's books "The Essence of Time", 200 pages, priced at £ 59 or $ 89 or E 94, ISBN 1-85312-949-6, and "The End of Time", 250 pages, priced at £ 79 or $ 122 or E 128, ISBN 1-85312-931-3 has been published by WIT Press and can be ordered from them by FAX on +44-2380-292853, by E-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or via the WIT Press web site: www.witpress.com (an automatic 10% discount will be applied to credit card orders placed via this site).