Adrian Bejan is a professor of mechanical engineering at Duke University and a former member of Romania’s national basketball team. He developed the Constructal Law: flow systems evolve over time so that they flow more easily. I asked him how that law reaches from physics to perception.
Basketball as a flow system
Adrian starts with basketball. He treats the game as a live system and a laboratory for a free society. We discuss what a system is and why the observer defines it.
Entropy and design
Adrian explains physics in plain terms and shares his thoughts on entropy and entropy generation. Earth itself is a flow system. Designs evolve, from swimming to commercial airplanes and birds. Freedom means removing the obstacles that impede flow, and principles matter more than copying nature.
Perception and time
The Constructal Law also explains perception. Adrian describes why time seems to move faster as we age, and how novelty slows it down. He closes on the physics and geometry of beauty.
Freedom to flow keeps a system alive, and Adrian ties that to how we perceive and orient.
What obstacle in your organization keeps work from flowing?
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Written by Ponch Rivera with AI assistance in production. The full conversation is in the player below.