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Time, Structure and Fluctuations

Ilya Prigogine’s 1977 Nobel Lecture on dissipative structures and self-organization far from equilibrium.

Authors: Ilya Prigogine
Date: 1977
Last checked: 2026-10-19
Access: Official PDF hosted by the Nobel Foundation.
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Prigogine’s Nobel Lecture explores how open chemical and physical systems far from thermal equilibrium maintain coherent structure through the continuous flow of energy and matter. It illuminates the scientific atmosphere of the late 1970s that shaped our book’s reflections on open loops and metabolic renewal.