Boltzmann's Approach to Statistical Mechanics
Abstract
Description
In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Ludwig Boltzmann explained how irreversible macroscopic laws, in particular the second law of thermodynamics, originate in the time-reversible laws of microscopic physics. Boltzmann's analysis, the essence of which I shall review here, is basically correct. The most famous criticisms of Boltzmann's later work on the subject have little merit. Most twentieth century innovations -- such as the identification of the state of a physical system with a probability distribution $\varrho$ on its phase space, of its thermodynamic entropy with the Gibbs entropy of $\varrho$, and the invocation of the notions of ergodicity and mixing for the justification of the foundations of statistical mechanics -- are thoroughly misguided.
16 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Chance in Physics: Foundations and Perspectives, edited by Jean Bricmont, Detlef Durr, Maria C. Galavotti, Giancarlo Ghirardi, Francesco Petruccione, and Nino Zanghi, Lecture Notes in Physics 574, (Springer-Verlag)
16 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Chance in Physics: Foundations and Perspectives, edited by Jean Bricmont, Detlef Durr, Maria C. Galavotti, Giancarlo Ghirardi, Francesco Petruccione, and Nino Zanghi, Lecture Notes in Physics 574, (Springer-Verlag)