Why Most Things Don't Stay Made: Entropy, Thermodynamics, and the Rarity of Persistence in Chemistry

This bridge artifact in the chemistry lane of the Structural Flow library examines a simple but often underemphasized condition of chemical practice: most structures formed in chemical systems do not remain. The paper argues that chemistry already operates inside entropy, that persistence of structure is conditional rather than guaranteed, and that familiar laboratory outcomes such as instability, degradation, reversion, competing pathways, and environmental overrun are not anomalies but recurring expressions of non-persistence under continued interaction. On that basis, it groups these recurring expressions into a chemistry-facing descriptor set while preserving the quantitative formalism of chemistry and thermodynamics as essential. This artifact does not introduce new chemical mechanisms and does not replace the already-closed cross-domain failure architecture of Structural Flow. Its burden is narrower: to make the rarity of persistence more structurally legible within the language and practice of chemistry.