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Presents the scientific methodology from the enlarged cybernetical perspective that recognizes the anisotropy of time, the probabilistic character of natural laws, and the entry that the incomplete determinism in Nature opens to the occurrence of innovation, growth, organization, teleology communication, control, contest and freedom. The new tier to the methodological edifice that cybernetics provides stands on the earlier tiers, which go back to the Ionians (c. 500 BC). However, the new insights reveal flaws in the earlier tiers, and their removal strengthens the entire edifice. The new concepts of teleological activity and contest allow the clear demarcation of the military sciences as those whose subject matter is teleological activity involving contest. The paramount question “what ought to be done”, outside the empirical realm, is embraced by the scientific methodology. It also embraces the cognitive sciences that ask how the human mind is able to discover, and how the sequence of discoveries might converge to a true description of reality.

1.1. Logical Necessity of the Three Dimensions as a Unit of Thought The mathematician does not look kindly on the simple question of why natural space should consist of precisely three dimensions. Instead of giving an answer he assumes a silent smile and shows us a version of space with an infinity of dimensions, as if space were some kind of toy for him to fiddle with to his heart's content.

This is an excellent book. Coming as it does from the pen of a scientist who is also an experienced teacher it fulfils all that the author set out to accomplish. Of the existing books on Thermodynamics comparatively few have succeeded in presenting the subject in so attractive and palatable a fashion—attractive because the art of the true teacher illumines and embellishes the whole work and palatable because, while the average engineering student has very often viewed the study of thermodynamics as a form of forced labour due to the wrong approach, Dr Schmidt, who was Professor of Thermodynamics in the Engineering University of Brunswick, succeeds from the outset in focusing the reader's attention and whetting his curiosity. He then proceeds so to build up the fundamentals as to make the deeper theories and their application, which are so ably handled later in the book, a revelation of clarity and development.

This paper aims to tackle in turn the merits and limits of Nicholas Georgescu‐Roegen's entropic model, as well as its implications for the methodological discourse in economics. This appraisal of the Georgescu‐Roegen's work emphasizes the emergence of the entropic nature of the economic processes as a paradigm à la Kuhn of explanation in social economics.

This work provides a critical assessment of the entropic model's main conceptual pillars, namely the role of mathematical formalism and the natural imagery of irreversibility. This discussion takes them in turn and develops a critique from a methodological point of view.

The focus of this work is that the proposed epistemological reconstruction of economics is vulnerable to attacks from two methodological objections. The first deals with the change of metaphor from the “pendulum” of mechanics to the “hourglass” of thermodynamics. The second refers to the changes this replacement of metaphors brings about as to the relevance of the formalism of the discipline.

This material has gathered arguments to show that the intellectual concurrence of the arguments onto the field of physics makes the methodological value of the new paradigm of entropy not transcend into a new logic of reasoning in economics. The limits of this approach stems from the same rationale for which it has got its revolutionary stature: what it proposes consists of a scientific discourse based on a mixture of evolutionary biology, economics and thermodynamics, which may open up new original and insightful perspectives, but which has never been justified on terms of economic nature alone.

IN RECENT YEARS a number of textbooks on applied thermodynamics (of American origin or American‐inspired) have given considerable emphasis to a new and restricted definition of the word ‘heat’. The actual definition takes various forms. From some it appears that heat must now be considered solely as energy in transit due to a temperature gradient and is not a form of energy that can exist inside a body. From others, that heat must be considered as an interaction between systems at different temperatures, the direction of the interaction being purely conventional or metaphorical.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the knowledge dynamics process based on the energy metaphor and the thermodynamics framework. Knowledge dynamics is analyzed as a transformational process that goes beyond the Newtonian logic used to date.

The research design is based on metaphorical thinking, critical analysis of the mostly used knowledge metaphors to date, and the logic of thermodynamics, which is the science of energy transformation.

Knowledge is conceived as a field, composed of three fundamental forms: rational knowledge, emotional knowledge and spiritual knowledge. Each form of knowledge can be transformed into another form, thus generating an iterative and interactive dynamics. The unity of knowledge is supported by the brain’s organic structure.

Understanding knowledge dynamics as a transformational process helps managers in their problem-solving and implementation of strategies in their organizations. Knowledge dynamics is fundamental to the learning and unlearning processes, and for stimulating innovation. Knowledge dynamics, as a transformational process, is influencing both organizational behavior as well as consumers’ behavior.

The present research uses for the first time a thermodynamics approach in understanding and explaining the knowledge dynamics, which is a transformational process of three fundamental forms of knowledge: rational, emotional and spiritual.

This study aims to simulate the flow and heat transfer through an air handling unit to reduce its energy consumption by a novel creative idea of using an air-to-air heat exchanger.

To do this, both first and second laws of thermodynamics energy and exergy balance equations were solved numerically by an appropriate developed computer code.

Using the air-to-air heat exchanger in dry conditions decreases the cooling coil load by 0.9 per cent, whereas the reduction for humid conditions is 27 per cent. Similarly, using air-to-air heat exchanger leads to an increase in the first law of efficiency in dry and humid conditions by 0.9 per cent and 36.8 per cent, respectively.

The second law of efficiency increases by 1.55 per cent and 2.77 per cent in dry and humid conditions, respectively. In other words, the effect of using an air-to-air heat exchanger in humid conditions is more than that in dry conditions.

This study aims to understand the difference between irreversibility in heat and work transfer processes. It also aims to explain that Helmholtz or Gibbs energy does not represent “free” energy but is a measure of loss of Carnot (reversible) work opportunity.

The entropy of mass is described as the net temperature-standardised heat transfer to mass under ideal conditions measured from a datum value. An expression for the “irreversibility” is derived in terms of work loss (W_loss) in a work transfer process, unaccounted heat dissipation (Q_loss) in a heat transfer process and loss of net Carnot work (CW_net) opportunity resulting from spontaneous heat transfer across a finite temperature difference during the process. The thermal irreversibility is attributed to not exploiting the capability for extracting work by interposing a combination of Carnot engine(s) and/or Carnot heat pump(s) that exchanges heat with the surrounding and operates across the finite temperature difference.

It is shown, with an example, how the contribution of thermal irreversibility, in estimating reversible input work, amounts to a loss of an opportunity to generate the net work output. The opportunity is created by exchanging heat with surroundings whilst transferring the same amount of heat across finite temperature difference. An entropy change is determined with a numerical simulation, including calculation of local entropy generation values, and results are compared with estimates based on an analytical expression.

A new interpretation of entropy combined with an enhanced mental image of a combination of Carnot engine(s) and/or Carnot heat pump(s) is used to quantify thermal irreversibility.

The purpose of this paper is to examine entropy generation rate in the flow and temperature field due pulsed impinging jet on to a flat plate. Heat transfer of pulsed impinging jets has been investigated by many researchers. Entropy generation is one of the parameters related to the second law of thermodynamics which must be analyzed in processes with heat transfer and fluid flow in order to design efficient systems. Effect of velocity profile parameters and various nozzle to plate distances on viscous and thermal entropy generation are investigated.

In this study, the flow and temperature field of a pulsed turbulent impinging jet are simulated numerically by the finite volume method with appropriate boundary conditions. Then, flow and temperature results are used to calculate the rate of entropy generation due to heat transfer and viscous dissipation.

Results show that maximum viscous and thermal entropy generation occurs in the lowest nozzle to plate distance and entropy generation decreases as the nozzle to plate distance increases. Entropy generation in the two early phase of a period in the most frequencies is more than steady state whereas a completely opposite behavior happens in the two latter phase. Increase in the pulsation frequency and amplitude leads to enhancement in entropy generation because of larger temperature and velocity gradients. This phenomenon appears second and even third peaks in entropy generation plots in higher pulsation frequency and amplitude.

The predictions may be extended to include various pulsation signal shape, multiple jet configuration, the radiation effect and phase difference between jets.

The results of this paper are a valuable source of information for active control of transport phenomena in impinging jet configurations which is used in different industrial applications such as cooling, heating and drying processes.

In this paper the entropy generation of pulsed impinging jet was studied for the first time and a comprehensive discussion on numerical results is provided.

Our physical universe is 1.5×10¹⁰ years old. It began with the Big Bang. There is some debate about what happened in the first tenth of a second! The first 3×10⁵ years were radiation dominated. Since then it has been matter dominated. (This in accordance with the first law of thermodynamics which states that total mass-energy is conserved.) The universe has continuously expanded in space and in the future either this may continue, or expansion may stabilise at a fixed size or the universe may contract in the Big Crunch (depending on the spatial curvature). At a certain scale the universe is spatially isotropic and homogeneous. Its trajectory exhibits increasing entropy in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. These statements are in accordance with certain models and empirical data: distant galaxies are receding from us at a velocity proportional to their distance; there is greater spatial uniformity at greater distances from us; there is uniform presence in space of radiation with a temperature of 2.7K; etc.