The second Law of Thermodynamics is pretty clear about it: The entropy of a system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time. (Entropy may be thought of as disorder or randomness). But, consider the history of Earth: It is a system that started out as a semi-molten mess. Later, it cooled and developed life, and it made those pesky structured organisms that went on to populate the seas and produce our jungles and forests. Then came those advanced animals that fashioned everything, even cities. Cities are much more ordered than jungles and so their entropy is lower.
Entropy(cities) < Entropy(jungles) < Entropy(molten mess).
So, what's going on? How did we manage to violate the law? Are we somehow miraculously, divinely above the rules?
and one thing further
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 | Comment 7 of 9 | 
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As pointed out in the article posted by Charlie, there is a point that I neglected to make: even if there were no organizing surface activity, the IR output of the surface and atmosphere of Earth would represent more entropy than the incoming solar visible and UV light, simply by virtue of the increased number of photons of lower energy being put into deep space (i.e., the author's "2nd reservoir").
