Is our society orderly or disorderly?

Is our society orderly or disorderly?

By Mochtar Buchori

JAKARTA (JP): Prof. Hans Christian von Baeyer's article on
"Disorderly Conduct" in the May/June edition of Sciences has
changed my old notions on order and disorder.

I am no longer sure how to interpret the political realities
in countries such as Myanmar and Turkey: order, disorder,
featureless order, orderly disorder, or order under apparent
disorder. Or is it disorder under apparent order?

The chancellor professor of the College of William and Mary in
Williamsburg, Virginia, U.S. discussed the phenomena of order and
disorder as encountered in the world of physics.

The examples he used were taken from ordinary life situations
and from experiments in physics. He suggested that the
generalizations about order and disorder formulated in physics
are not only useful in understanding physical phenomena, but can
also be used to understand social phenomena.

He said that the intimate relationship between order and
disorder explained in physics in terms of entropy can also be
appreciated from a less mechanical, more intuitive point of view.
And to support this thesis he cited a poem by Wallace Stevens
called "Connoisseur of Chaos". It reads as follows:

A. A violent order is disorder; and

B. A great disorder is an order. These

Two things are one

Although at first it looks confusing, it is nonetheless
beautiful. It says in a very concise manner that order and
disorder are not separate, but intimately related.

In his article von Baeyer refers to "order" as an elusive
concept. It is also a subjective thing. Reading his explanation
about these two characteristics of order prompted me to think
about my own situation. I have my own way of "ordering" my
material; books, journals, clippings, notes and magazines etc.

I put them in various places in my office and in the house,
and I know exactly where they are. I can find whatever I want
within minutes. But my wife and daughter consider the way I
"order" my things "disorder". From time to time they try to bring
"order" into the house, especially into my office. But every time
they reorder my things, I become confused. I cannot find the
things I want as easily as usual, because the ordering system has
changed. I feel that my office becomes disorderly every time my
wife or my daughter puts it "in order". This is a situation which
every person must have experienced in his or her daily life.

Being a subjective matter, order, according to von Baeyer, is
like beauty. It is in the mind of the beholder. If beauty lies in
the eyes of the beholder, order and disorder is lodged "in the
beholder's growing understanding". But while beauty is always a
subjective thing, order is "a precise and powerful instrument in
the tool chest of science".

The man who converted the intuitive concept "order" and
"disorder" into quantitative entities was Ludwig Boltzmann, an
Austrian physicist. More than a century ago Boltzmann made the
astonishing claim -- which history proved right -- that entropy
(the gradual process whereby temperature differences tend to even
out) is "molecular disorder", and that the law of increasing
entropy can be interpreted as "the tendency for things to become
more disorderly".

The conceptual bridge that enabled Boltzmann to connect the
quantitative term "entropy" to the intuitive concept of disorder
was the idea of probability. Boltzmann observed that in any
collection of molecules an orderly arrangement is improbable, and
so it is assigned low entropy. On the other hand, a messy,
disorderly arrangement is common and probable, and accordingly it
is assigned high entropy. Today, schoolchildren learn the bland
maxim that "order" is low entropy, and "disorder" is high
entropy.

But to physicists, von Baeyer said, "the more probable state
is more disorderly". This means that in the natural course of
events my office has the tendency to become more disordered.
Order can be restored, to be sure, and entropy lowered, but only
at the expense of energy on the part of my wife or daughter.

On the basis of this understanding, it can be said that if
disorder is the natural tendency of things, then order can be
achieved only at a certain cost. The greater the magnitude of
order we aspire, the greater the cost. So what is this cost? And
are we capable and willing to pay it?

In terms of social relations, the cost is the willingness and
capability for self-restraint. Only societies with a high
capability for self-restraint will be able to generate and
maintain order. Societies with a low capability for self-
restraint will never be able to achieve order. In this kind of
society social entropy, that is the social equalization process
or the society's desire to eliminate discrepancies, will remain
high.

Von Baeyer introduced two concepts in his article which are
very useful for understanding our society. These two concepts are
"apparent order (or disorder)", and "hidden disorder (order)".

What is "apparent order"? The example from physics used by von
Baeyer is the smooth and shiny face of the blank portion of a
compact disc. He called this "the embodiment of featureless
order". But under a microchip "that level plane becomes an unruly
heap of atoms piled higgledy-piggledy like pebbles on the beach".
What we have here is hidden disorder behind apparent order.

On the other hand, a hologram recorded on a photographic plate
"looks like a jumble of splotches and whirls, devoid of pattern,
shape or order". Yet, laser light shining through it "creates a
nifty 3-D image of the Taj Mahal, revealing the order hidden
under apparent disorder".

So, what did the recent general election reveal about our
society? Did we see hidden order under apparent disorder, or
hidden disorder under apparent order? Or was it simply disorder?

The writer is an observer of social and cultural affairs.

Window: Societies with a low capability for self-restraint will
never be able to achieve order. In this kind of society social
entropy, that is the social equalization process or the society's
desire to eliminate discrepancies, will remain high.