Metronomes Synchronizing: Entropy & the 2nd Law

[jeffinbath]

There is a fascinating demo on YouTube of "32 metronomes synchronizing". They are all started at different times but in barely more than 2 minutes they are all synchronized and working as one unit. If you have not seen this then go to Google and type in "metronomes synchronizing".
Could somebody explain to me why this phenomenon is not disobeying the 2nd Law please.

 

[jerromyjon]

Hi and welcome to PF! They are synchronizing because they share a floating base which causes those out of phase with the majority to shift closer to phase a little every cycle. The second law of thermodynamics is related to random interactions.

 

[jbriggs444]

There is a fascinating demo on YouTube of "32 metronomes synchronizing". They are all started at different times but in barely more than 2 minutes they are all synchronized and working as one unit. If you have not seen this then go to Google and type in "metronomes synchronizing".
Could somebody explain to me why this phenomenon is not disobeying the 2nd Law please.

Fail to wind them up and see what happens.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Could somebody explain to me why this phenomenon is not disobeying the 2nd Law please.

Could you explain why you think it is?

You have 32 coupled oscillators with some losses in the coupling. So there's no surprise that you end up in the lowest energy normal mode.