Life is a _single_ self-propagating chemical reaction.
So a computer is just an electrical current.
What Is Life? (2019)
91–100 of 117 posts
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#92The purpose of life is for the consciousness to realize that it is part of the whole. There is some form of an attractor force, outside of our immediate 3d world, that is attracting all self-aware sentient entities to become. Applying western science and demanding evidence when it cannot be comprehended by the human mind is like the petulant child who asks why at the end of every sentence. Terrence Mckenna is probabl…
Terence McKenna really was a magician, in the sense that he could speak magic words and manifest his ideas in your head very clearly.
The concept you reference is what he called "The Transcendental Object at the End of Time". See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XMz4hWR5i0
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
Computers and their programs consume energy in the form of electricity to do work. How is that not metabolism? I recall seeing a reference to a biological species that also consumes electricity. In addition, they use that energy to (often) lower internal entropy and replicate themselves. They evolve with the assistance of a symbiote (humans), and are subject to competitive pressures for evolutionary fitness. Mating i…
That's exactly the difference, computers consume energy, while metabolism is the process of creation (and of course, consumption) of energy. An unplugged computer won't start to autonomously break down and convert chemicals into electricity to keep itself running, hence it's not alive.
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Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#94"Life is a chemical system that uses energy to keep itself from reaching chemical equilibrium."
I like the above "definition" from this YT video (This Ciliate is About to Die): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibpdNqrtar0
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#95The purpose of life is for the consciousness to realize that it is part of the whole. There is some form of an attractor force, outside of our immediate 3d world, that is attracting all self-aware sentient entities to become. Applying western science and demanding evidence when it cannot be comprehended by the human mind is like the petulant child who asks why at the end of every sentence. Terrence Mckenna is probabl…
> it cannot be comprehended by the human mind
> ancient civilizations have figured out
How did ancient civilizations figure it out, if the human mind cannot comprehend it?
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#96In the book Sapiens there was an interesting thought that life is basically information that is trying to "survive". In the same way you can look at religion as some sort of information that spreads in people minds and without people it would ceise to exist or have even reasons to exist - the same way like a virus is just information that goes from host to host. Viruses can represent the simplest form of what life is…
I think religion is actually an evolved mechanism for perpetuating (human) life. I developed this theory when my wife and I visited some friends in rural Kansas. We attended their Christian church service and I was struck by the potential evolutionary advantages that would play out if the preacher’s advice was taken at face value: 1) Anti-LGBTQ rhetoric: if only a fraction of LGBTQ individuals were shamed into a hete…
I've heard this the other way round: religions that perpetuate reproduction (by discouraging contraceptives, encouraging child bearing, encouraging raising your children with the same beliefs, etc) have an evolutionary advantage over other religions, so religions are likely to have these traits after a few centuries.
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#97Life can be defined in terms of entropy. The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics says it's always increasing, and it was once lower. The law only applies for closed systems, so if we generalize to any system sometimes entropy increases. Life is a system that consumes low entropy and transforms into high entropy [negative entropy]. From light to other life, life is consuming lower forms of entropy to then use it in its information processing systems.
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#98The purpose of life is for the consciousness to realize that it is part of the whole. There is some form of an attractor force, outside of our immediate 3d world, that is attracting all self-aware sentient entities to become. Applying western science and demanding evidence when it cannot be comprehended by the human mind is like the petulant child who asks why at the end of every sentence. Terrence Mckenna is probabl…
So you're making an assertion about something that the human mind cannot comprehend. Nice contradiction + random dig at people to make yourself feel superior.
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#99In the book Sapiens there was an interesting thought that life is basically information that is trying to "survive". In the same way you can look at religion as some sort of information that spreads in people minds and without people it would ceise to exist or have even reasons to exist - the same way like a virus is just information that goes from host to host. Viruses can represent the simplest form of what life is…
I often think that from instant zero of the first artefact that could be qualified as life form.. from then to us there's a common structure to solve chaos and persist in time. It's a looong inheritence chain.
Re: What Is Life? (2019)
#100A virus is a meta lifeform. It is life that operates given the existence of metabolising organisms. Life operates directly over the physical matter in the universe, a virus just operates a step above this.
Makes me wonder.. do viruses have viruses ?