General > Biology
The first wet alife?
ikke:
--- Quote from: jknilinux ---And ikke: Then would you think a clanking replicator is alive? If it is, then is a "symbiotic" RepRap alive? If a clanking replicator isn't alive, then what is the difference between a really small clanking replicator and a ribozyme replicator? Defining life is definitely a tough problem!
--- End quote ---
Nice examples to provide food for thought. I know it is inconsistent, but instinctively I would not consider the reprap life. I feel it lack autonomy in replication. It needs to be told to (self) replicate by and engineer, so no life. But would it be life if I replaced engineer by phase of the moon? Is its autonomy decreased by having to need to tell the machine it needs to replicate itself, as opposed to any other device?
Maybe the discussion on this is life and that is not tells more about the human need to set itself apart from everything else. In that respect it might mirror the discussion on what constitutes intelligence. In order to set us apart from animals we have the term intelligence, without a clear definition. To have something that sets us apart from other lumps of cosmic dust, something that makes us unique we have the term life. In both cases if we discover not to be so unique, we change the definition we have.
Maybe in the end it is about statistics. Of all the matter in the universe, only a certain fraction has the ability to interact with other matter (due to physical distance, or chemical incompatibility, for instance). Of that fraction only a fraction can interact in a way that constitutes selfreplication. Of the selfreplicating fraction only a certain fraction interacts in a way that shows conditional use of external inputs. Of that fraction only a fraction is ‘intelligent’.
To make matters complicated, there is also the gliding scale aspect. The aforementioned categories are discrete. Either it does or does not. To what category does an entity belong if it is done sometimes?
Numsgil:
That's most of life for you. Things we consider black and white, on closer inspection, have a gray area gradient between them. There are definitely things that are not alive. A diamond, for instance, undergoes virtually no change over millions of years. And there are some things definately alive. Us, for instance. But what about fire? In a particular sense it's sort of like primitive life. It feeds and replicates and dies. But if you don't want fire in your definition of life, you have to invent more qualifications (subject to evolution, etc.). In the end lawyers will determine what is and is not alive, but it won't change the fact that there is actually a large gradient of different life like processes.
ikke:
A colleague mentioned being sentient as a requirement for being alive. A nice addition to the discussion, and a factor I hadn't considered. It has the same issues with definition and gliding scale as all the other elements, but was to me a relevant addition.
Numsgil:
That's a pretty narrow definition. Would mean trees aren't alive.
ikke:
--- Quote from: Numsgil ---That's a pretty narrow definition. Would mean trees aren't alive.
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One could argue that for instance a tree's response to parasites can be proof of sentience
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