Is the Universe a Living Organism?

[idav]

Why can't that "something" affect the universe(s) similarly to how organisms are acted on by outside forces?

I believe that "something" to be close to nothing but not neutral otherwise nothing would have ever started. So I think there has always been at least a "something" but it is a foundation and not necessarily outside the system.

 

[idav]

It does, however, invalidate the idea of there being a first cause.

Theres no first cause just an uncaused first.

 

[1137]

I don't agree with this universe as a living organism theory, it doesn't make sense.

But thanks for discussing it anyways!

 

[1137]

Though I do think that there is more to reality than we think; it is more complex, fundamentally surpasses even reason, interconnected... But the universe itself being conscious / a living organism doesn't make sense.

 

[Storm]

I don't agree with this universe as a living organism theory, it doesn't make sense.

But thanks for discussing it anyways!

Does that mean you don't want to talk to me anymore? :sad4:

Though I do think that there is more to reality than we think; it is more complex, fundamentally surpasses even reason, interconnected... But the universe itself being conscious / a living organism doesn't make sense.

Well, few things in the category of "theologies one rejects" do resonate....

 

[1137]

Does that mean you don't want to talk to me anymore? :sad4:

Haha I still want to talk to you!

 

[Storm]

Haha I still want to talk to you!

Well, then say something!

 

[idav]

Though I do think that there is more to reality than we think; it is more complex, fundamentally surpasses even reason, interconnected... But the universe itself being conscious / a living organism doesn't make sense.

Reminds me of an Outer Limits I saw. The earth was dieing cause someone ripped a hole in the universe. Thy found that it was like a cell when they looked outside the box.

A system certainly and the rest depends on how you define life. life needs energy and that is fundamentally how the universe began.

 

[1137]

Reminds me of an Outer Limits I saw. The earth was dieing cause someone ripped a hole in the universe. Thy found that it was like a cell when they looked outside the box.

A system certainly and the rest depends on how you define life. life needs energy and that is fundamentally how the universe began.

Yeah but I agree with Poly that calling it a living organism is too misleading, at least for now. Where is the natural selection and the reproduction, for example? The black hole argument is interesting, but I don't think it has any supporting evidence.

 

[idav]

Yeah but I agree with Poly that calling it a living organism is too misleading, at least for now. Where is the natural selection and the reproduction, for example? The black hole argument is interesting, but I don't think it has any supporting evidence.

We don't know enough to make a distinction which I think is largely due to the fact that there is no 'real' distinction to make. Apart from not knowing enough about what separates animate from inanimate, now with the dark energy issue, scientists found that we only know maybe about 30% of the universe. Like knowing about the earth but being clueless about water and whether water is significant.

 

[oldbadger]

Hi..... Every single unit of matter and energy is alive! The trouble with us humans is that we have this conceit which makes us view everything from a kind of megalamaniacal point of view. Life is like.... er.... us! God is like.... er.... us!

Instead of looking out, for instance to black holes etc (which are very much within our universe!) why not try looking inwards, to the smallest unit of matter possible? If we had the means to watch this it would be moving, active, alive....... but not how we humans like to perceive life.

There is no thing that does not live. If you want to argue that it has to think or be aware of itself, or reproduce, or interact outside itself, that is surely just human conceit? Even the space in between may be alive, in that this might be the unit of nothingness that the mystics have referred to in the past?

Our science cannot touch this..... is not yet fit to approach it, even....??

 

[PolyHedral]

Instead of looking out, for instance to black holes etc (which are very much within our universe!) why not try looking inwards, to the smallest unit of matter possible? If we had the means to watch this it would be moving, active, alive....... but not how we humans like to perceive life.

Last time I checked, fields of complex numbers (which is what every particle of matter is, at some level) don't qualify in any meaningful way as "alive."

There is no thing that does not live. If you want to argue that it has to think or be aware of itself, or reproduce, or interact outside itself, that is surely just human conceit?

"Life" is a human concept. We can use it however we want. (But to communicate, we must use it consistently.)

 

[Storm]

Last time I checked, fields of complex numbers (which is what every particle of matter is, at some level) don't qualify in any meaningful way as "alive."

I would be delighted to argue the idea that numbers of any sort are more than human symbolic thinking. After I wake up all the way.

 

[PolyHedral]

I would be delighted to argue the idea that numbers of any sort are more than human symbolic thinking. After I wake up all the way.

Well, maths would still work even if humans weren't here, and we can't be here if certain maths didn't work.

 

[Storm]

Well, maths would still work even if humans weren't here, and we can't be here if certain maths didn't work.

Math is a human method of codification and analysis. The fact that it's a supremely effective one doesn't mean it exists outside our minds.

It expresses reality; it does NOT dictate reality. (Much akin to language.)

 

[idav]

Where is the natural selection and the reproduction, for example?

Here is a pretty decent article that gets into the science of the issue and comparing inanimate matter to organisms. Just depends whether your looking at the system as a whole or just its components.

https://www.rossu.edu/medical-schoo...tiontoBiochemistryprematriculationsegment.pdf

 

[PolyHedral]

Math is a human method of codification and analysis. The fact that it's a supremely effective one doesn't mean it exists outside our minds.

It expresses reality; it does NOT dictate reality. (Much akin to language.)

Somewhat bizarrely, there have been a few cases where it has "dictated" reality. That is, the mathematics has disagreed with experiment in some way, such as producing multiple answers, and when further experiment is done, the multiple answers turn out to correspond to physically real phenomenon. This is what happened with antimatter: Dirac's equation produced two answers, one of which corresponded with the electron as designed, and the other didn't appear to mean anything until the positron was discovered 4 years later.

 

[oldbadger]

Last time I checked, fields of complex numbers (which is what every particle of matter is, at some level) don't qualify in any meaningful way as "alive."

"Life" is a human concept. We can use it however we want. (But to communicate, we must use it consistently.)

I must admit that your posts always 'blow my mind', or rather, bring me to a standstill, with your knowledge and intellect.

And so...... with respect....... I ask you to recognise that everything you posted above is all about the human megalamania that I referred to previously? Please put down the 'meaningful way' and 'human concept' and just look at everything, buzzing, rotating, encircling, dashing............ in movement. Let's consider movement as life. Maybe the stilled nothingness of space is the greater?

We have been told, First?-Last!, Look out?-look in!, Pride?-humility!. I ask you to consider that we are as mere children, in kindergarten, when faced with these mind-blowing considerations.

All the best...

 

[Storm]

Somewhat bizarrely, there have been a few cases where it has "dictated" reality. That is, the mathematics has disagreed with experiment in some way, such as producing multiple answers, and when further experiment is done, the multiple answers turn out to correspond to physically real phenomenon. This is what happened with antimatter: Dirac's equation produced two answers, one of which corresponded with the electron as designed, and the other didn't appear to mean anything until the positron was discovered 4 years later.

Apologies, but you might as well have posted 3 pages of Greek script for all the sense that argument made to me.

What little sense I can make of it is way too easily rebutted by the simple reality that positrons existed long before anyone thought of that equation. The fact that we didn't know they were there does not mean math invented them.

 

[crossfire]

Somewhat bizarrely, there have been a few cases where it has "dictated" reality. That is, the mathematics has disagreed with experiment in some way, such as producing multiple answers, and when further experiment is done, the multiple answers turn out to correspond to physically real phenomenon. This is what happened with antimatter: Dirac's equation produced two answers, one of which corresponded with the electron as designed, and the other didn't appear to mean anything until the positron was discovered 4 years later.

Mathematicians can be mystics, too.