The thermodynamic law that things devolve was based on steam engines that don’t evolve, but our universe does, and quantum theory explains why. At every moment, quantum events explore every possibility to let evolution discover ordered combinations that survive, so when electrons find stable orbits around protons, they move together to increase order. Atoms evolve by nucleosynthesis in stars to create an order that exists as long as they do, not just temporarily. For example, a lead atom is 82 protons, 125 neutrons, and 82 electrons in a high order state with a half-life of millions of years, which is permanent in our terms.
A cool fridge on a hot day needs a power supply to stay cold but lead atoms don’t need any energy to maintain their order, just an unlikely sequence of events, and eggs are the same. Matter then evolves by finding unlikely combinations that survive, not by maintaining a heat imbalance. For example, that matter began when extreme light collided head-on (4.3.1) is by any standard a very unlikely event, but the result is stable. When light that was free entangled into an electron, order increased but no energy is needed to maintain it. The evolution of matter then increases order without an energy cost.
This conclusion doesn’t contradict the second law, that energy is needed to create order, because the search for stable combinations needs energy. Evolution let atoms lawfully form ordered molecules like water, until eventually super-molecules like RNA that copy themselves led to the cells that made us. The evolution of life then followed on from the evolution of matter.
If evolution was limited to biology, the second law would reign supreme, but it isn’t. Matter also evolves, so evolution is also a universal principle, as it is driven by the same quantum law that creates disorder. Evolution works by finding stable possible states, while devolution works by finding stable probable states, but if both have the same cause, devolution is needed for evolution to occur. For our universe to possibly evolve, it must also probably decay, so devolution is a byproduct of evolution, just as neutrinos are byproduct of electrons.
The evolution of matter is an anti-entropy process that the second law doesn’t recognize, but it occurs. Evolution was built into our universe from its inception, so the grand evolution going on all around us is as fundamental as heat flows. Evolution then explains what the second law can’t, that life exists because order evolved.