Helge S. Kragh, Entropic Creation: Religious Contexts of Thermodynamics and Cosmology (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 272 Pps., $114.95.

Helge S. Kragh is a Professor in the History of Science Department at the University of Aarhus, Denmark. The present book is a contribution to two different but related areas of history: first, it is a history of the scientific concept of cosmology in the period of 1850 to 1920; second, it belongs to the history of ideas insomuch as it is a case study on how religion related to science in the period referenced above concerning the topic of physical cosmology. 

According to the second law of thermodynamics, as formulated by the German physicist Rudolf Clausius, the entropy of any closed system will inevitably increase in time, meaning that the system will decay and eventually end in a dead state of equilibrium. This study deals with the hypothesis of a thermal end of the world peripherally, but the main concern of the text is on its corollary: that the world must have had a beginning in time. Thus, thermodynamics, the author argues, leads not only to ideas regarding the end of time, but also to ideas regarding the beginning of time. In seven chapters, Kragh examines in detail the discussion and views on the heat death and entropic argument that were raised and argued for in the period under discussion. In what follows, the contents of each chapter will be more fully highlighted.

Chapter two, ‘Some Early Ideas on Decay and Creation’, follows the introduction, and reconstructs the thermodynamics-like arguments posed by scientists and philosophers in the early nineteenth century and prior periods (note that thermodynamics, in truth, is a late nineteenth century phenomena).This reconstruction serves as the foundation for the material that follows. A condensed study of the early development of the mechanical theory of heat and its cosmological significance follows in chapter three. The focal point of chapter three, ‘Thermodynamics and the Heat Death’, is the notion of heat death as it emerged in the 1850s and 1860s. As a consequence of the heat death scenario, the universe can have existed only for a finite period of time.

 The fourth chapter, ‘The Entropic Creation Argument’, deals with attempts by various patrons to turn the second law into a scientifically-based proof for the existence of God. He somewhat departs from his historical account in order to discuss more fully and systematically the meaning and contexts of the entropic creation argument. According to this 'entropic creation argument', thermodynamics warrants the conclusion that the world once begun or was created. In chapter five, entitled ‘Concepts of the Universe’, Kragh gives a fairly complete account of the debate in France, Britain, and Germany, noting that it was in Germany that the debate assumed important political and ideological aspects. Indeed, it was in Germany, the materialists and positivists engaged in battle with Christian scholars over the cosmological consequences of thermodynamics

This fifth chapter includes a description of the astronomer’s universe with respect to the question of whether the universe is spatially and materially infinite or finite. Chapter six and seven are almost postscript-like material in that ‘Post-1920 developments’ and ‘Shadows from the past’ are not pertinent to the previously stated intention of the book: i.e., to examine the development of the scientific concept of cosmology in the period of 1850 to 1920. Pointedly, chapter six discusses, very briefly, how the discussions regarding the role of entropy took new turns after World War I. Chapter seven follows and discusses, likewise rather briefly, the discussions regarding the role of entropy after World War II, especially in respect to how cosmological thought was restricted in the Soviet Union. 

The core chapters within this title are chapters four and five, which concern detailed analyses of the heat death and entropic arguments from the aforementioned time period, respectively. The central issues in the thermodynamics-religion debate rarely turned up in the scientifically literature and were more often than not discussed in other contexts which were at times obscure, as Kragh acknowledges. The central themes of his study are focused around the concepts of decay and origin. 

All in all, one cannot go wrong in buying this book. It gives one a detailed analysis of the entropic creation argument from 1850 to 1920, a discussion which has not heretofore been highlighted and examined. One can find little to criticize Kragh about regarding his historical treatment of this period, but I do question why the later two chapters were included within this text. Both are seemingly irrelevant to the focus of the study. As such, they may detract from the overall argument of the text. Beyond this perceived flaw, however, I find Kragh’s work to be infinitely illuminating. It is therefore to be unreservedly recommended to historians of science.

Bradford McCall, Regent University, Virginia Beach, VA.