Page "What Is Life?" Paragraph 12

In chapter VII, he maintains that " order-from-order " is not absolutely new to physics ; in fact, it is even simpler and more plausible.

But nature follows " order-from-disorder ", with some exceptions as the movement of the celestial bodies and the behaviour of mechanical devices such as clocks.

But even those are influenced by thermal and frictional forces.

The degree to which a system functions mechanically or statistically depends on the temperature.

If heated, a clock ceases to function, because it melts.

Conversely, if the temperature approaches absolute zero, any system behaves more and more mechanically.

Some systems approach this mechanical behaviour rather fast with room temperature already being practically equivalent to absolute zero.