The Dissipative Structure is a thermodynamic “attractor” state, very similar in some ways to the state of equilibrium. Ilya Prigogine, a Belgian chemist, discovered it, and won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for it in 1977. It represents the state of a discrete system or structure, with a maximal rate of energy flow that displays an internal order or pattern in its energy flow patterns.
The closer that a structure is to the ideal of the dissipative structure pattern, the more energy it flows through itself. I call the pattern of a dissipative structure, it’s entropically functional order. Where equilibrium is a “basin” of attraction, dissipative structures represent a “dome” of attraction, or an inverted basin because the energy is speeding up, rather than slowing down.
