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The first wet alife?

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peterb:
note that cristals also grow under the right environment, okay they dont replicate.
But how a bush fire, it does replicate to other trees.
I think with live, a definition is required, and that might get complex.


But I think it should respond to its environment, with a strategy to survive environment dangers.

For example the bushfire shouldnt run out of trees. So it needs a way to conserve itself.
A simple biological virus, folows simple rules often, but their numbers make them survive.
But then what about the wheater patern, its shifting and continously changing, and its a closed system on itself.
There should be a next rule I think that such systems are not called life, but be called environment.

An environment is a system that folows rules of its own, wich are generated by itself.
Its a system which is often chaotic in nature, and has no goal to survive, it simply is there, like space itself.


Then is darwinbots life ?
It is artificial life, in a sense that its enviroment is based on math, it folows simple rules so it can stay alive in that area.
The area is however verry limited, a bots definition doesnt work on a different planet with no computers.

So a next rule for more comonly known life might be :
That it can deal with its chemical environment, as if it contains a language, a system (biomolecular bioligy) to interact in its environment.

But maybe appart from known life it could also exist in, plasma, radiation, quantum fields, etc, things we now hardly understand.

Testlund:
My criteria for life:

1. It can mutate
2. It can make copies of itself
3. It can grow or change

In this I think we have two sub categories:

1. Real life made through some planetary event
2. Artificial life made by humans

But I could agree that there is a grey zone here which may be hard to define.


--- Quote from: ikke ---
--- Quote from: Numsgil ---That's a pretty narrow definition.  Would mean trees aren't alive.
--- End quote ---
One could argue that for instance a tree's response to parasites can be proof of sentience

--- End quote ---

The same thing could be said when you turn the key in your car it sends an electric impulse that starts the engine. Like electrical impulses from our brain causes the heart to beat and lungs to breath.
Maybe we're godly builders evolving more and more complex creations with our creativity.
One day we may have artificial beings walking around calling us gods that will in turn create their own things, which may in turn become more advanced to create things....in an endless process.
In any case these beings will have evidence somebody created them.  

Numsgil:
Trees could maybe be considered sentient if you use the philosophical definition instead of the scifi term for "what separates man from the other animals", and if you take a very broad stance on what sensation and experience mean.  But then your definition of life is so broad as to be worthless.

Testlund:
Could philosophy be used to answear that? Philosophy in my opinion is more about purpose and meaning of things. To ponder the reasons behind it all.
I think we need to define some criteria that must exist to call something sentient.
It is difficult because you must question the meaning of the word and when it's right to use it. Maybe some words have to be redifined, like life for instance.
Maybe being alive means being functional, while dead means something that doesn't function at all, like a car without fuel. Maybe life is burning of energy.

Numsgil:
The common definition of life I was taught in school was evolution, reaction to stimulus, independent reproduction, movement, made of one or more cells, uses DNA, and maybe one or two other points I forget.  In my mind, instead of defining life, I would define life-like properties, and have something's "aliveness" be a measure of those properties.  Fire has some life-like properties, but lacks any ability to evolve.  Viruses can't independently reproduce, but they can evolve, etc. etc.

The philosphical definition of sentience is the ability to perceive pain and pleasure.  It's commonly used in animal rights arguments.  In scifi, it tends to mean something with the spark of intelligence or self-awareness which separates Humans from the lower animals (and a trait we might have on common with other "intelligent" life).

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