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What is Life? What is Reality? What makes you you? What is consciousness? What makes us alive?
Can scientists make living matter from non-living matter?
This was pose to me in a tribe;
"We don't have the technology right now to create life but, there is no fundamental precept preventing this from occurring."
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SF Bay Area
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 2:31 AMDepending on where you draw the line as to what is life and what you mean by create "We don't have the technology right now to create life" may or may not be true any more. Certainly the major compnents have been falling into place. Self organizing flims for cell walls for example and self replicating protiens.
Very exciting stuff.
It looks like life is a natural extension of carbon chemistry in any place with energy gradients and liquid water. -
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Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:28 PM
>"Depending on where you draw the line"<
Consciousness ...
">It looks like life is a natural extension of carbon chemistry in any place with energy gradients and liquid water."<
You're funny ...can you you define "Natural" again for me? and while you're at it Energy? -
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Re: What is Life?
Sun, June 28, 2009 - 12:39 AMch: Consciousness ...
That seems a bit high. There is plenty alive which has no consciousness.
Energy
Lightning is the electric breakdown of air by strong electric fields and is a flow of energy. The electric potential energy in the atmosphere changes into heat, light and sound which are other forms of energy.In physics, energy (from the Greek ἐνέργεια - energeia, "activity, operation", from ἐνεργός - energos, "active, working"[1]) is a scalar physical quantity that describes the amount of work that can be performed by a force, an attribute of objects and systems that is subject to a conservation law. Eight different forms of energy exist to explain all known natural phenomena. These forms include (but are not limited to) kinetic, potential, thermal, gravitational, sound, light, elastic, and electromagnetic energy. The forms of energy are often named after a related force.
Any form of energy can be transformed into another form, but the total energy always remains the same. This principle, the conservation of energy, was first postulated in the early 19th century, and applies to any isolated system. According to Noether's theorem, the conservation of energy is a consequence of the fact that the laws of physics do not change over time.[2]
Although the total energy of a system does not change with time, its value may depend on the frame of reference. For example, a seated passenger in a moving airplane has zero kinetic energy relative to the airplane, but non-zero kinetic energy relative to the Earth.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy
Natural
4: having an essential relation with someone or something : following from the nature of the one in question <his guilt is a natural deduction from the evidence>
www.merriam-webster.com/dictio...natural
So "a natural extension of carbon chemistry" means that there is nothing unique about it. Not intervention is needed. Just as ice naturally forms when water freezes, life will arrise any where the basic ingredients are present.
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Re: What is Life?
Sun, June 28, 2009 - 1:31 AMSwarm
what about gravity? Does it too follow all the 'laws' relating to energy? Are these rules set in stone? -
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Re: What is Life?
Sun, June 28, 2009 - 2:33 AMMy favorite definition of gravity is "matter sucks."
Gravitation
Gravitation is a natural phenomenon by which objects with mass attract one another.[1] In everyday life, gravitation is most commonly thought of as the agency which lends weight to objects with mass. Gravitation compels dispersed matter to coalesce, thus it accounts for the very existence of the Earth, the Sun, and most of the macroscopic objects in the universe. It is responsible for keeping the Earth and the other planets in their orbits around the Sun; for keeping the Moon in its orbit around the Earth, for the formation of tides; for convection (by which fluid flow occurs under the influence of a temperature gradient and gravity); for heating the interiors of forming stars and planets to very high temperatures; and for various other phenomena that we observe. Modern physics describes gravitation using the general theory of relativity, in which gravitation is a consequence of the curvature of spacetime which governs the motion of inertial objects. The simpler Newton's law of universal gravitation provides an excellent approximation for most calculations.
The terms gravitation and gravity are mostly interchangeable in everyday use, but a distinction may be made in scientific usage. "Gravitation" is a general term describing the phenomenon by which bodies with mass are attracted to one another, while "gravity" refers specifically to the net force exerted by the Earth on objects in its vicinity as well as by other factors, such as the Earth's rotation.[2][3]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity
more at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intr...relativity
No need for quotes. All physics is a very precise description of how what we see behaves. As such it is never set in stone, but it is very hard to find a means of displacing it because the new theory has to accound for the old information.
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 7:39 AMLife is an ongoing metabolic process.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, is still there."
What makes us, us, is a combination of genetics, experience and chance.
Conciousness is an emergent quality of the complexity of the physical brain.
What makes us alive is the continuance of the metabolic process.
Anyone can make living matter from non-living matter, it's called eating.
We're on the verge of creating completely artificial bacteria. -
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 8:19 AMGrim
Imagine I could replicate the three primary building blocks of 'us', which you name as Genetics, Experience and Chance.
Now lets imagine that I create two subjects who are Genetically the same and subject them to the exact same Experiences and whims of Chance.
Would they be the exact same person in terms of conciousness? Were they to fill out questionnaires such as what is your favorite colour, do you believe in God, woudl you kill Hitler when he was a child if you could etc etc etc would they answer the exact same questions with the same answers? -
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 8:23 AMYou can, it's called having children.
Those two people wouldn't be the same because of the chance element. They would be very similar. -
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 8:30 AM"You can, it's called having children."
Grim don't be foolish. You cannot believe that any two children are exactly the same genetically and you CERTAINLY cannot say that they are the exact same in terms of Experience even if you imagine that chance is the same for both of them. Myself and my sister couldn't be two more different people.
Have you any siblings? Are you the same people in terms of personality and conciousness? -
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Re: What is Life?
Thu, June 25, 2009 - 12:07 PMYou can create life, that's what the first part refers to.
I answered the second part separately.
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Re: What is Life?
Fri, June 26, 2009 - 4:12 AMIdentical twins are natual clones from the exact same egg, It doesn't getmore genetically identical than that. -
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Re: What is Life?
Fri, June 26, 2009 - 7:21 AM'Identical twins are natual clones from the exact same egg, It doesn't getmore genetically identical than that.'
And yet identical twins can be very very different people with different personalities! Clearly they are more than the sum of their parts. -
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Re: What is Life?
Fri, June 26, 2009 - 7:47 AMNeither their experiences nor the chance factor are the same for them. -
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Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:16 PM
My Blog
people.tribe.net/chaz/blog...2b8176ef77
There is no such thing as "life;" there are only living creatures and plants.
To "be alive" is not to have "life" but, "Being" alive is the property of a living creature.
While not the property of many of the actual parts making up the whole (the atoms and molecules),
"being alive" is a property of the Whole when these parts interact in the appropriate dynamic pattern. (This is god)
"the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts"
Something does not become alive, therefore, by having life added to the nonliving thing. Something becomes alive when its parts are ordered (by God this spiritual intelligence) in the appropriate dynamic interaction to exhibit being alive as one of its properties.
If the question is asked, therefore, "What must he added to non-living matter in order to make it living matter?" the answer is not that some essence of life must be added, but that the non-living matter must be brought into that dynamic patterned interaction appropriate for being alive. (And only god can do this)
There appears then to be no a priori reason why scientists cannot make living matter from non-living matter in the laboratory. *Their success or failure has no necessary theological significance.
In no ease will they truly "create" life, from non living matter for *they* - living creatures are needed to bring another living creature into being. -
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:18 PM
"mechanism by which consciousness arises?"
Consciousness and what depends upon it (NOT the brain) is inexplicable on mechanical figures and motions.
Once visiting the parts of the whole within it, we find only other parts pushing one another, and never anything by which to explain the perception or awareness (quantum levels)
It’s a simple substance (god is), and not in the composite of parts or in or of the machine.
the visitor (Scientist) upon entering it, would observe nothing but the properties of the parts, and the relations they bear to one another. But no explanation of perception, or consciousness, can possibly be deduced from this conglomerate. No matter how complex the inner workings of this machine, nothing about them reveals the inner workings of a conscious being.
there is no possible way that the purely mechanical principles of materialism can account for the phenomena of consciousness.
Furthermore, by means of the soul or form, there is a true unity which corresponds to of the I (eye) in us; such a thing could not occur in artificial machines, nor in the simple mass of matter, however organized it may be.
whatever is the subject of perception and consciousness must be truly whole, a single “I” properly regarded as one whole conscious being. An aggregate of matter is not truly whole and so cannot be regarded as a single I, capable of being the subject of a unified mental life.
“in natural perception and sensation, it is enough for what is divisible and material and dispersed into many entities to be expressed or represented in a single indivisible entity or in a substance which is endowed with genuine unity.”
If perception (and hence, consciousness) essentially involves a representation of a variety of content in a simple, indivisible “I,” then we may construct an argument against materialism as follows:
matter can’t explain awareness. Awareness is a state whereby a variety of content is represented in a true unity. Thus, whatever is not a true unity cannot give rise to awareness. Whatever is divisible is not a true unity. Matter is infinitely divisible. Hence, matter cannot form a true unity. Hence, matter cannot explain (be identical with, give rise to) perception or consciousness.
True Unity ...yeah that's it ...God... Divine intelligence
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Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:30 PM
Grim'
what is "chance factor" ... isn't that like an oxymoron?
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Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:25 PM">Imagine I could replicate the three primary building blocks of 'us', which you name as Genetics, Experience and Chance."<
Great post Paul -
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Re: What is Life?
Sat, June 27, 2009 - 1:42 PM
Consciousness is all there is….
Does a flower have mind? it's conscious
We have to understand what consciousness is,
consciousness means Awareness "being aware of"
At first thought it would SEEM that brains are needed
But, Plants have awareness too
there is no reality…no facts, no truth...you are just a witness -Awareness
Awareness/Presence is not a concept.
Everything else is.
What are You?
the Real You are not a concept or object.
Clear seeing shows that You are not the body-mind because You are what is aware of the body-mind.
Therefore, You are Awareness.
*The world and the body-mind appear in You--You do not appear in the world.
there are different forms of consciousness (among other distinctions) phenomenal consciousness vs. access consciousness, direct experience vs. reflexive consciousness.
Consciousness is a product of brain activity, however we also know that consciousness is not a direct result of any neuronal activity, because there are plenty of things the neurons in our central nervous systems do of which we are not aware, like adjusting the size of the eye's pupil.
That's does not mean Intuition is not filtered though our systems and brain activities of awareness ...UT
We have to open up our BANDWIDTH away from the brain and into our soul (our Rising sign in Astrology or our Emotional body - it has an intelligence, to know Not think...
we've been programed ...
young children have an innate sense of awareness (of people if they're good or bad) that many adults do not have ...also animals i.e. dogs etc can "sniff it out" or sense it out
there's a bigger extent of energy transfer we are capable of experiencing within our consciousness ;-)
"There is no logical way to the discovery of elemental laws. There is only the way of intuition, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance." - Albert Einstein
"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift." - Albert Einstein -
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Re: What is Life?
Wed, July 1, 2009 - 11:22 AMIf there was no sun there would be no life....so life to me is a reaction between light and sound (vibrations, sub atomic),two different types of energy, physical energy "sound and light", all matter is energy, what does it consitute that a body alive, is energy condensed into form and into harmony (why I like string theory), the harmony of the energy creates the functions of a body, each form of energy in harmony creates various life elements from germs to humans all part of the same energy, in part of the same consciousness in various degrees due to its harmony, consciousness is awareness. What brings this energy together to create specific forms is the Consciousness of the being, its harmony.
For me the universe is an organism of collective consciousness and all matter has its harmony in it. All life and matter is light and sound...thats because I study Sat Mat Yoga.....Kirpal Singh.
If mankind ever create life, for me it would be the creation of an organism, the life comes form the spiritual side of the G-dhead already created.
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