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Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

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Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#71

Post by daxfohl »

skybrian wrote: post #60
SubuSS wrote: post #55

It seems the author (or paper authors) are mixing up individuality with life/agency? IOW a hard drive with information is working against entropy to keep information active through time. But that doesn't make it an individual - IOW I see how this can be used to define a singular unit, I don't see how this idea is used to delineate the 'emergence' part: What am I missing?

Well, it's an individual hard drive. Maybe "individual" is independent from "alive"? It seems like a message in a suitable environment can have as much agency as a virus? This is how computer viruses work. A hard drive can work the same way; it's just a brick until someone plugs it in.

I still agree with Stephen Hawking's interpretation. (Or at least he's the first one I'd heard make this interpretation, probably not his per se). Anyway, that consciousness emerges from natural selection: ability to attack/defend is strongest when you can predict the actions of your prey/predator. Ability to predict those actions is greatly strengthened when the individual can reflect on thoughts and project those onto others. This reflection is where consciousness aka "life" emerges from.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#72

Post by downerending »

smileypete wrote: post #28

There's a good quote in this FT interview with Peter Piot, who co-discovered Ebola: http://archive.is/N6fAF “The absence of bad luck in life is the most important thing.”

This sounds a lot like Schopenhauer. He said, or perhaps someone summarized him, something like: Life is hell, and the main goal is to choose a room farthest from the flames.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#74

Post by renewiltord »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #64
GavinMcG wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buddhists would likely disagree with that, since in Buddhism (though this is a significant oversimplification) enlightenment comes with the unrooting of all attachments and the dissolution of "self".

What's over-simplified about that statement? That's a perfect summary of Buddhism - it encompasses the point completely without going into techniques. The only part that's missing is "...with the goal of avoiding suffering".

Comments like that are a bellwether of the place they’re posted in. People will hedge their comments whenever they fear there is a sufficient concentration of “well, actually”s in the audience.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#75

Post by Retric »

clairity wrote: post #69
Retric wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Viruses increase entropy like all life. Their reproductive process destroys a much larger and more complex cell. Plants convert light into chemical energy at low efficiency, the rest goes to waste heat. Animals do the same thing with chemical energy.

yes, as @selestify also noted, that seems contradictory on the surface but actually isn't. the virus itself is a reduction of entropy while it's net existential entropy contribution is positive. where you draw the system boundary matters for defining entropy changes, but long-term we're all bound to increase entropy, otherwise life (and our semi-living cousins) would be violating the laws of thermodynamics writ large…

When you simply include the raw materials the virus is made from before and after it forms you have a net loss of entropy. So, it’s not clear what you mean by boundaries in that case.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#76

Post by branweb »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #64
GavinMcG wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buddhists would likely disagree with that, since in Buddhism (though this is a significant oversimplification) enlightenment comes with the unrooting of all attachments and the dissolution of "self".

What's over-simplified about that statement? That's a perfect summary of Buddhism - it encompasses the point completely without going into techniques. The only part that's missing is "...with the goal of avoiding suffering".

I think it's oversimplified because there would need to be a long explanation on what is meant by "self", which the commentor very wisely put in scare quotes.

To the parent: actually I think this "death of decoherence" pretty closely matches the Buddhist doctrine of interdependent arising, so not sure about the disagreement there.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#77

Post by Der_Einzige »

downerending wrote: post #72
smileypete wrote: post #28

There's a good quote in this FT interview with Peter Piot, who co-discovered Ebola: http://archive.is/N6fAF “The absence of bad luck in life is the most important thing.”

This sounds a lot like Schopenhauer. He said, or perhaps someone summarized him, something like: Life is hell, and the main goal is to choose a room farthest from the flames.

Haha, funny enough, he argued for antinatalism before that term was heavily used. He argued for a proto-form of negative utilitarianism, and in the case of some of his disciples, they argued that people should commit suicide

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philipp_Mainl%C3%A4nder (disciple advocating for suicide)

Many took their arguments to be closer to "to live is to suffer and suffering is the ultimate bad thing. You shouldn't inflict that suffering on anyone else (and maybe not even on yourself)

No wonder Nietzsche was so afraid of what schopenhaur was doing to philosophy. His work and his followers advocate for the ultimate form of life denial. Similar to jainists too.

Though, I still find Schopenhaur to be more compelling on this than anyone else...

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#78

Post by tsimionescu »

clairity wrote: post #70
ppod wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the least complex entity that you ascribe agency to?

i haven't thought about it enough to even speculate, but one criteria would be the ability to make decisions, however simple. viruses are entirely passive in their action. they're exquisitely complex structures (for what they are) existing entirely by chance that happen to have the property of self-replicating in the presence of the right cellular machinery. they don't decide to do anything, they just are, and theref…

Unfortunately, by your definition, computer programs are closer to being an individual than viruses. I am assuming that is not intended, so probably the idea needs more refinement.

I also think this is a weakness of the original article: a lot of things we probably shouldn't consider individual life forms would probably fit the definition (nations, for example).

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#79

Post by downerending »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #77
downerending wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds a lot like Schopenhauer. He said, or perhaps someone summarized him, something like: Life is hell, and the main goal is to choose a room farthest from the flames.

Haha, funny enough, he argued for antinatalism before that term was heavily used. He argued for a proto-form of negative utilitarianism, and in the case of some of his disciples, they argued that people should commit suicide https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philipp_Mainl%C3%A4nder (disciple advocating for suicide) Many took their arguments to be closer to "to live is to suffer and suffering is the ultimate bad thing.…

I as well. Though not the term, the idea is very old. In Ecclesiastes 4, Qohelet says something like The dead are better off than the living, and better still are those who were never born.

I will say that the question of whether the living should commit suicide is rather different than whether new lives should be brought into the world. Sunk costs and all that.

We will all be dead soon enough. Not sure there's much point in speeding things up.

Re: Life Is Made of Unfair Coin Flips

#80

Post by clairity »

tsimionescu wrote: post #78
clairity wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i haven't thought about it enough to even speculate, but one criteria would be the ability to make decisions, however simple. viruses are entirely passive in their action. they're exquisitely complex structures (for what they are) existing entirely by chance that happen to have the property of self-replicating in the presence of the right cellular machinery. they don't decide to do anything, they just are, and theref…

Unfortunately, by your definition, computer programs are closer to being an individual than viruses. I am assuming that is not intended, so probably the idea needs more refinement. I also think this is a weakness of the original article: a lot of things we probably shouldn't consider individual life forms would probably fit the definition (nations, for example).

yes, good point. some autonomy and skin-in-the-game is probably required too.

the article seems to have sparked some good conversation, so it's been useful, if not as strong as it might be.

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