Entropic Nexus Project
I’m excited to be synthesizing work I’ve done throughout my career into an exploratory project that I’m calling the “Entropic Nexus Project: connecting quantum, thermodynamic and physiological time”.
Explanation
My scholarship has been rooted in a critical realist perspective, emphasizing that ontology determines epistemology—our understanding of reality shapes how we acquire and apply knowledge. This principle underpins both my book, Clinical Physiology: A Muscle-Centered Approach, and my vision for the Clinical Inquiry Fellowship, where future scholars are guided to approach clinical problems with a foundational understanding of the systems they aim to influence.
The Entropic Nexus Project extends this commitment to foundational inquiry by exploring the relationship between quantum measurement, thermodynamic entropy, and physiological control processes across scales of time and organization. While the project spans physics, thermodynamics, and biology, its ultimate aim is to deepen our understanding of human health and disease. Specifically, it seeks to uncover how fundamental constraints—imposed by entropy and information flow—shape the emergence, persistence, and breakdown of physiological control systems in health and disease.
In physical therapy, clinical reasoning often operates across multiple temporal scales (e.g., real-time motor control vs. long-term tissue adaptation) and within complex systems (e.g., neuromuscular coordination, systemic inflammation). Understanding how control emerges—and sometimes fails—within these systems could lead to better therapeutic strategies, refined models of clinical reasoning, and enhanced evidence-informed practice.
This project aligns with my role as a professor of physical therapy by advancing our understanding of human health through foundational principles of systems thinking, thermodynamics, and quantum-informed models of biological control. It also reinforces the mission of the Clinical Inquiry Fellowship, offering a philosophical and scientific framework for approaching clinical complexity with rigor and depth.
Background
My professional and academic journey has been shaped by a deep curiosity about how systems—whether human, mechanical, or theoretical—maintain control, respond to stress, and ultimately fail or recover. This thread runs through my work as a physical therapist, my doctoral research in ergonomics, and my collaborations with systems thinker Bog Sniezek and my ScD mentor, Robert Karasek.
In my clinical practice as a physical therapist, I worked across a spectrum of conditions, from patients recovering from critical illnesses in intensive care units to those managing minor musculoskeletal disorders. Across these diverse cases, one thing became clear: health is fundamentally about control—control of movement, control of physiology, and even control over one’s environment and choices. Yet, this control operates across multiple time scales, from nanosecond movements of particles, to split-second adjustment of muscle fibers and to long-term adaptations in posture, metabolism, and tissue integrity. More importantly, control cannot exist outside of time. Control inherently involves predicting future states, adapting to present conditions, and responding to past events. Whether it’s a heartbeat regulated on a second-by-second basis or the gradual structural adaptation of a tendon over weeks and months, control is, at its core, temporal. Time provides the framework within which control mechanisms function, and without it, the very concept of control loses meaning.
My doctoral research, guided by Robert Karasek, extended these clinical observations into a broader theoretical framework. Together, we explored what became Stress-Disequilibrium Theory, which integrates insights from thermodynamics and control theory to explain how chronic stress erodes an individual’s ability to maintain homeostasis and control across biological and behavioral systems. The theory highlighted how entropy—disorder and loss of usable energy—can manifest not just at a cellular level but also in mental and emotional domains, limiting an individual’s “Control Capacity” and increasing their vulnerability to disease and dysfunction.
My collaboration with Bogdan Sniezek introduced me to his Unified Systems Theory, which challenges traditional views of complexity and system design. Sniezek proposes that many of our struggles with complex systems stem not from inherent complexity but from flawed assumptions about how we perceive and model systems. His work emphasizes the importance of shifting perspectives—from viewing systems as mere collections of interacting parts to understanding them as emergent wholes shaped by deeper principles of organization and control.
These threads—physiological control, stress-disequilibrium, and system complexity—form the foundation for the Entropic Nexus Project. By examining the interplay between quantum measurement, thermodynamic entropy, and physiological control across scales of time and organization, this project seeks to illuminate fundamental principles governing health, disease, and recovery. It represents not only a continuation of my work with Karasek and Sniezek but also an attempt to bridge their theories with modern insights from quantum mechanics, systems biology, and clinical physiology.
Ultimately, this background reflects a conviction that deeper insights into foundational principles of reality are necessary to achieve deeper insights into human health and well-being. Through this lens, physical therapy becomes more than just a discipline of intervention—it becomes a domain of applied systems thinking, where we act as agents of control and recovery within highly dynamic and deeply interconnected systems.
Philosophical Foundations: The Peripatetic Connection
At its core, the Entropic Nexus Project is not just an exploration of physics, thermodynamics, or physiology—it’s an inquiry into how we understand reality itself. This pursuit aligns deeply with the Peripatetic philosophy of Aristotle, whose school of thought emphasized learning through observation, conversation, and the constant interplay between theory and practice. Aristotle believed that true understanding arises not from abstract reasoning alone but from a synthesis of empirical evidence, rational inquiry, and lived experience—a harmony between the observed world and the frameworks we use to describe it.
In many ways, this project mirrors that approach. It seeks to bridge empirical observations from clinical practice with theoretical insights from quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, and systems theory. Just as Aristotle walked the Lyceum grounds engaging in dynamic conversations to refine ideas, this project walks the boundaries between disciplines, exploring how time, entropy, and control shape living systems across scales.
The Peripatetic tradition also emphasizes the importance of teleology—understanding the purpose or “end” of a system. In physical therapy, the “end” is clear: to restore agency, health, and control to individuals navigating illness, injury, or dysfunction. Yet, achieving this goal requires not only practical interventions but also a deeper understanding of the fundamental principles governing life and health. The Entropic Nexus Project aims to contribute to this understanding by examining how time and entropy set constraints on control systems, and how those constraints may manifest in the healing process, resilience, and recovery.
Aristotle’s commitment to holism—the belief that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts—resonates with both Sniezek’s Unified Systems Theory and Karasek’s Stress-Disequilibrium Theory. Each reminds us that reductionist approaches often obscure the deeper principles at play. Similarly, the Entropic Nexus Project refuses to be confined by disciplinary silos, recognizing that true insight often emerges in the spaces between established fields of study.
In this way, Peripatetic PT serves as both the philosophical foundation and the guiding spirit for this project. Just as Aristotle walked and reflected to refine his understanding of the world, this project invites readers, collaborators, and fellow thinkers to join a metaphorical walk—a journey across the landscapes of physics, physiology, and philosophy—to ask fundamental questions about time, control, and health.
Whether you’re a clinician seeking a deeper framework for practice, a scholar exploring the philosophical underpinnings of systems theory, or simply a curious traveler on the path of inquiry, the Entropic Nexus Project is an invitation to engage in a shared exploration—one rooted in both theoretical rigor and practical wisdom.
Theological Foundations: A Critical Realist Perspective
At the heart of the Entropic Nexus Project lies not just an exploration of scientific principles but also an inquiry into what these principles might tell us about reality itself. This pursuit is deeply influenced by my theistic worldview, which aligns with Alister McGrath’s Scientific Theology—a framework that seeks to reconcile theology and science through critical realism. McGrath argues that both theology and science, while distinct in their methodologies, are united by a shared commitment to understanding reality as it truly is, not merely as it appears to us.
McGrath’s work emphasizes that natural theology—the study of God through nature—must be built on a foundation of critical realism. This aligns with the core philosophical underpinning of The Entropic Nexus Project: that ontology determines epistemology. Our understanding of time, entropy, and control systems must begin with a commitment to discovering the deeper structures of reality, not merely constructing models for their predictive utility.
In this context, the work of Scott Turner and Denis Noble becomes particularly relevant. Both have tackled the challenge of teleology—the idea that living systems appear to act with purpose. Turner, in Purpose and Desire, and Noble, in The Music of Life, argue that biology cannot be fully understood without acknowledging that living systems exhibit goal-directed behavior across scales of organization. These arguments challenge reductive mechanistic views of life, suggesting instead that control and agency are not illusions but real features of living systems.
From this perspective, time and entropy are not just physical constraints—they become the stage upon which agency and purpose unfold. The arrow of time, as shaped by entropy, provides the conditions under which control emerges, persists, and ultimately breaks down. Measurement, whether at the quantum scale or the physiological scale, represents moments of interaction where agency asserts itself within a dynamic and temporal framework.
The Entropic Nexus Project, then, is not merely a scientific exploration—it is also a philosophical and theological reflection. It operates from the conviction that science and faith are not adversaries but complementary ways of seeking truth about reality. Just as Aristotle’s teleological framework viewed natural processes as striving toward certain ends, this project acknowledges that the apparent purposefulness of living systems might reflect a deeper reality, not merely an illusion of chance and selection.
In this sense, the Entropic Nexus Project seeks not only to explore the relationships between quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, and physiology but also to uncover what these relationships might suggest about the nature of life, purpose, and the deeper fabric of reality. Through this lens, time becomes not just a physical parameter but a medium through which order, agency, and meaning emerge—an idea that resonates deeply with both critical realism and the natural theological tradition.
This intersection of science, philosophy, and theology provides not only intellectual depth to the project but also a reflective space where questions of purpose and meaning are given their rightful place alongside equations and empirical observations. In doing so, the Entropic Nexus Project aims to honor both scientific rigor and theological humility, recognizing that both disciplines offer valuable insights into the complex, interconnected systems that define life and existence.
Whether viewed as a scientific inquiry, a philosophical exploration, or a theological reflection, this project is, at its core, a pursuit of truth—about time, about control, and about the patterns that give life its structure and meaning.
So let’s walk together, question deeply, and see where this path leads.