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Is this your area of expertise? I'm asking because making this distinction does sound useful to me, but I'm no biologist nor philosopher.

dekken_ 5y ago
I didn't say it wasn't useful. My comment is in terms of physics rather than biology or chemistry. i.e. in physics, there is little difference but complexity between a rock and a human.
- enkid 5y ago
  I don't think that many physicists would agree. There's this whole idea if entropy in physics, which is basically a valuation of information in a system, and humans would be much more complex when looking at that than a rock. There's also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a human body than there is for a rock.
  - dekken_ 5y ago
    > There's also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a human body than there is for a rock. Yes, it's complexity, that's my point. > There's this whole idea if entropy in physics I am aware, you're assuming it's not related, whereas I would say it very much is.
    - dahart 5y ago
      What does complexity mean, exactly? How does it demark the line between living and not, is there a threshold, and what is the threshold? There’s also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a car, a computer, or the planet earth that is made of rocks, than there is for an individual rock. Our solar system is extremely complex, yet is not alive. So complexity doesn’t seem to mark the line between living and non-living things at all. Saying life is “complexity” seems reductionist and almost information-free, it doesn’t really explain or even shed any useful light on the difference between living things and non-living things, since there are plenty of examples of high complexity, low-entropy inorganic objects & systems. We can synthesize complexity all day, but we don’t know how to synthesize life yet.
  - yldedly 5y ago
    One interesting aspect is that living organisms are in thermodynamic non-equilibrium, while most dead matter always evolves towards equilibrium.
    - dekken_ 5y ago
      > One interesting aspect is that living organisms are in thermodynamic non-equilibrium On what scale? Can you provide some sources/references please?
      - yldedly 5y ago
        Can't find a good general intro, but these articles take this viewpoint: https://science.mit.edu/life-away-from-equilibrium/ https://science.mit.edu/life-away-from-equilibrium/ https://www.pnas.org/content/114/3/423 https://www.pnas.org/content/114/3/423 Edit: Here's a good intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10cVVHKCRWw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10cVVHKCRWw
    - neatze 5y ago
      This is also, best strategy to search of extra terrestrial life, the concept of entropy for living systems deeply fascinates me, because how simple everything becomes (conceptually); life is entropy maximization systems in universe, looking at human kind it most efficient too.
robbiep 5y ago
The philosophical name for this concept is panpsychism. Personally, I’m a panentropist (my own creation) - I hold that the spectrum of life/consciousness varies depending on the level of entropy. So a flame has a higher level of consciousness than a piece of paper and oxygen molecules. But when you combine them they increase their level. It’s weird but it might be correct - doesn’t address issues of the hard problem of consciousness however
- FredPret 5y ago
  That’s pretty interesting. The more possible states a system has, the more room for consciousness. The ultimate organism is then either civilization itself, or the whole universe, depending on how you want to draw the line.
  - FabHK 5y ago
    > The more possible states a system has, the more room for consciousness That is one of the postulates of Integrated Information Theory, which aims to give an account of how consciousness can arise from physical substrates. (The idea seems closely related to the concept of entropy.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theory
- The_rationalist 5y ago
  A living being is a machine designed to reduce entropy, the opposite of your hypothesis
  - angst_ridden 5y ago
    A living being is a machine designed to reduce localized entropy. In decreases internal entropy while creating greater external entropy.
    - bufbupa 5y ago
      That still doesn't rectify the conflict. The living being is reducing local entropy -- meaning it's less conscious than if it maximized local entropy per gp comment. Or put in real terms, lighting yourself on fire likely does not make you more alive/conscious even though it definitely increases your entropy. If anything, it seems like the reversal of entropy would be a better description of life. To make paper and oxygen from fire would have higher consciousness than a fire itself

dekken_ 5y ago

I didn't say it wasn't useful. My comment is in terms of physics rather than biology or chemistry. i.e. in physics, there is little difference but complexity between a rock and a human.

enkid 5y ago
I don't think that many physicists would agree. There's this whole idea if entropy in physics, which is basically a valuation of information in a system, and humans would be much more complex when looking at that than a rock. There's also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a human body than there is for a rock.
- dekken_ 5y ago
  > There's also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a human body than there is for a rock. Yes, it's complexity, that's my point. > There's this whole idea if entropy in physics I am aware, you're assuming it's not related, whereas I would say it very much is.
  - dahart 5y ago
    What does complexity mean, exactly? How does it demark the line between living and not, is there a threshold, and what is the threshold? There’s also a lot more interesting stuff going on inside a car, a computer, or the planet earth that is made of rocks, than there is for an individual rock. Our solar system is extremely complex, yet is not alive. So complexity doesn’t seem to mark the line between living and non-living things at all. Saying life is “complexity” seems reductionist and almost information-free, it doesn’t really explain or even shed any useful light on the difference between living things and non-living things, since there are plenty of examples of high complexity, low-entropy inorganic objects & systems. We can synthesize complexity all day, but we don’t know how to synthesize life yet.
- yldedly 5y ago
  One interesting aspect is that living organisms are in thermodynamic non-equilibrium, while most dead matter always evolves towards equilibrium.
  - dekken_ 5y ago
    > One interesting aspect is that living organisms are in thermodynamic non-equilibrium On what scale? Can you provide some sources/references please?
    - yldedly 5y ago
      Can't find a good general intro, but these articles take this viewpoint: https://science.mit.edu/life-away-from-equilibrium/ https://science.mit.edu/life-away-from-equilibrium/ https://www.pnas.org/content/114/3/423 https://www.pnas.org/content/114/3/423 Edit: Here's a good intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10cVVHKCRWw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10cVVHKCRWw
  - neatze 5y ago
    This is also, best strategy to search of extra terrestrial life, the concept of entropy for living systems deeply fascinates me, because how simple everything becomes (conceptually); life is entropy maximization systems in universe, looking at human kind it most efficient too.

robbiep 5y ago

The philosophical name for this concept is panpsychism. Personally, I’m a panentropist (my own creation) - I hold that the spectrum of life/consciousness varies depending on the level of entropy. So a flame has a higher level of consciousness than a piece of paper and oxygen molecules. But when you combine them they increase their level. It’s weird but it might be correct - doesn’t address issues of the hard problem of consciousness however

FredPret 5y ago
That’s pretty interesting. The more possible states a system has, the more room for consciousness. The ultimate organism is then either civilization itself, or the whole universe, depending on how you want to draw the line.
- FabHK 5y ago
  > The more possible states a system has, the more room for consciousness That is one of the postulates of Integrated Information Theory, which aims to give an account of how consciousness can arise from physical substrates. (The idea seems closely related to the concept of entropy.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theory
The_rationalist 5y ago
A living being is a machine designed to reduce entropy, the opposite of your hypothesis
- angst_ridden 5y ago
  A living being is a machine designed to reduce localized entropy. In decreases internal entropy while creating greater external entropy.
  - bufbupa 5y ago
    That still doesn't rectify the conflict. The living being is reducing local entropy -- meaning it's less conscious than if it maximized local entropy per gp comment. Or put in real terms, lighting yourself on fire likely does not make you more alive/conscious even though it definitely increases your entropy. If anything, it seems like the reversal of entropy would be a better description of life. To make paper and oxygen from fire would have higher consciousness than a fire itself