Can things without bodies live?

... no, generating energy is not impossible - it simply requires energy in one form (for example, solar) to generate energy in another form (for example, electrical) ... anyhoo, you don't have to take my word for it - just google "conservation of energy" ... here's one from thinkquest.org: "Energy in a system may take on various forms (e.g. kinetic, potential, heat, light). The law of conservation of energy states that energy may neither be created nor destroyed." ...

Im not here for a lesson in the generation of energy, I know darned well that energy is conserved and can only be converted. Life has the ability to search and convert energy, your machines are devoid of that ability.

... if you prefer to treat "create" as a synonym for "convert", that's okay by me ... anyhoo, as autopoietic systems by definition convert a net influx of high-grade energy into (self-regenerative) work plus a net outflux of low-grade energy, they cannot be devoid of that ability ... that is simply how autopoietic systems are defined ... if they are devoid of that ability, then they are not autopoietic systems ...

Can you explain why you introduced this theoretical system into the debate. Its controversial and it does not describe any thing that can be described as living without a body. An example might just be useful.

... to elaborate on that, we probably also need a definition of "body", considering that "body" is usually taken to correlate with the "identity" of a living thing ... however, in an autopoietic system, it does not ... in an autopoietic system (such as an instance of cellular life) matter is transient and identity is precisely the continuity of the dynamics ... that is, over time a cellular life may replace most (if not all) of the matter it makes use of with new matter ... so if it is the dynamics of life that defines the identity of a life, what does it mean to do a computer simulation of life? ... that is, if a computer simulation of cellular life exactly reproduces the dynamics of cellular life, with the only difference between the two being that the former makes use of virtual matter whereas the latter makes use of physical matter, is the computer simulation an actual instance of life? ... and if so, does virtual matter count as a "body"? ...

Do we not need to know that it is aware, conscious of its being?

... in your estimation, is a bacterium aware and conscious of its being? ... or do such things only appear in more complex forms of life, such as humans? ...

Bacterium has a certain desire and can you deny its ability to succeed is not an act of awareness. It may not be as we know it but that desire has a certain intention that can be described as such. Life has that formula to adapt, to succeed that the innate machine could never possess.

... and here's what Maturana and Varela propose that this rudimentary awareness looks like: the cellular wall of an autopoietic system is breached by something in its environment - this is detected by the network of self-regenerating processes, which attempts to repair the breach ... if it cannot make the repairs, the autopoietic system ceases to exist ... to repair the breach requires raw materials and energy which now need replenishment - again, this is detected by the network of self-regenerating processes ... if it cannot replenish the raw materials and energy, the autopoietic system ceases to exist ... again, this is simply Maturana and Varela's essential description of cellular life ... if you object to their characterization of life as a "machine", that's fair - your concept of a machine may be different from theirs ... but an autopoietic system has the same rudimentary "desire" to live and "awareness" of threats to its existence that cellular life has precisely because it is a description of cellular life ...

It can not replicate itself nor adjust its formula to survive. It can not lie dormant waiting for circumstances to change. Life can come into being without any other intelligent design it can exist only by its formula. Your machine needs a creator, life has no need, only the correct circumstances.

... if you require self-replication to be part of an essential description of life, then yes - autopoiesis is an inadequate description ... but if replication is a requirement to be alive, are mules dead? ... EDIT: at any rate, since autopoiesis is a description of cellular life, and since cellular life evolved without any intelligent design, autopoietic systems do not need a creator ...

Sorry I'm missing something here, what is your contention in referring to this theoretical description of life that could be criticized as inadequate? I cant see your motive.

... none, I suppose ... I was under the impression that y'all were seeking an essential description of life and threw autopoiesis out as an option ... but since you so strongly object to it (and no one else seems interested), I guess I'll be on my way ...

A friend of mine posed this question on another forum:

Ok, free your mind.









Now that your mind has been freed, consider this... things without bodies may be alive. Things like the rain, fog, wind, fire and even cities and the internet could be living organisms.

Take, for example, the internet. One could posit that the internet is just using people as their hosts, just like a virus uses its host's cells to replicate. Think about it, it evolves, changes, grows, and self-heals. It does all this through people.

Could this be true? What do you think?

Do viruses live? They do reproduce, kill, etc. like any other living thing could. I'm not sure about cities, but who knows?

What do you think?

A programming error may very well cause life in a program, cause life in a computer or the internet. Just that the program may not know how to express it's own selfawareness.

Usually good coding has an error each 200th line, whilst really good coding only has an error each 400th line. Bugs are very hard to find and rid from programming, and it's not alwas predictable how coding will behave.

High levl of concious programming may well be only 10 years away. Imo we have already low lvl concious robots/androids, but they'r clumbsy and very slow, which is why we don't consider them "aware" even though they forfill most of our definition of awareness.

When we cant decide on what our own consciousness really is, how can we claim, we could invent it?

? maybe this confused bunch of philosophers can't decide upon it, but I'm sure the highly paid researchers in various tech labs can, and gaming AI designers.

I was not referring to philosophers but science in general. Can you tell me where it resides in the brain? I don't think so.

That is totally irrelevant to say where it resides, in order to make a functional conciousness.

Conciousness it the ability to respond activly and compute to input.

When we cant decide on what our own consciousness really is, how can we claim, we could invent it?

Are we talking about human consciousness or what?