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Entropy tells us how many states are possible. But does it tell us how a system moves through them?
In statistical mechanics, entropy measures the size of the accessible state space.
But two systems with similar entropy can behave very differently.
A turbulent flow and a coherent vortex may occupy similarly large spaces of possibility, while differing greatly in localization, coherence, pathway structure, and transition behavior.
This paper explores a structural distinction:
Entropy → how much is possibleStructure → how those possibilities are organizedTraversal → how a system moves through themExperienced time → may emerge, in part, from the ordered traversal of possibility
The proposal is not that entropy is inadequate, that time is unreal, or that thermodynamics should be replaced.
The question is narrower:
What additional quantities are needed to describe how systems traverse, organize, and persist within large state spaces?
The clock measures duration.The system experiences traversal.
Paper: https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/5X86F
#Entropy #Time #ComplexSystems #Emergence #StatisticalMechanics #RelationalFieldTheory