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Offlinedjd586
Underpants Gnome

Registered: 02/03/03
Posts: 1,655
Last seen: 14 years, 1 month
Define Life
    #1500583 - 04/28/03 12:04 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Here's something interesting for all you guru's to debate over. It's a topic I had to engage many times in my post graduate studies. Can you define life? What is your basic concept of a living thing? Does it have to breathe. . .Reproduce. . .Eat? I think you'll find that life's a little harder to define then what you might think. To give you an example of exactly how hard it is, 4 of my Biology professors in college, who had their Docterates in Biology, basically locked themselves in a room and knocked their heads together for 4 months trying to write a publication of the definition of life. In the end they failed becuase none of them could find a common ground of what they believed what life consists of.


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Phase 1... collect underpants... phase 2...??? ... Phase 3 - PROFIT!

Edited by djd586 (04/28/03 12:05 PM)

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Offlinequemo
dontknowitall

Registered: 12/19/02
Posts: 137
Loc: worldcitizen
Last seen: 19 years, 10 months
Re: Define Life [Re: djd586]
    #1500602 - 04/28/03 12:17 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

well, i'm not gonna burn my hands on this baby.... :laugh:

mmmm perhaps i will, but i certainly will take my time for this one, gimme a year or so....but mine will be more philosphical  i guess than biological... (there probably be more than one way of looking at it)... 

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OfflineStrumpling
Neuronaut
Registered: 10/11/02
Posts: 7,571
Loc: Hyperspace
Last seen: 12 years, 10 months
Re: Define Life [Re: quemo]
    #1501686 - 04/28/03 06:04 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)



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Insert an "I think" mentally in front of eveything I say that seems sketchy, because I certainly don't KNOW much. Also; feel free to yell at me.
In addition: SHPONGLE

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Offlineatomikfunksoldier
T'was born oftrue in the yearof the cock!

Registered: 04/07/03
Posts: 1,500
Loc: a human-infested anthill
Last seen: 20 years, 6 months
Re: Define Life [Re: Strumpling]
    #1502018 - 04/28/03 07:57 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

are you talking about organic life?


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enjoy the entertaining indentity i have constructed for you while you can.

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Anonymous

Re: Define Life [Re: djd586]
    #1502140 - 04/28/03 08:22 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Life is simply the physical manifestation of "living",and vica versa

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OfflineStrumpling
Neuronaut
Registered: 10/11/02
Posts: 7,571
Loc: Hyperspace
Last seen: 12 years, 10 months
Re: Define Life [Re: Anonymous]
    #1502316 - 04/28/03 09:04 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Life is what happens before death.


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Insert an "I think" mentally in front of eveything I say that seems sketchy, because I certainly don't KNOW much. Also; feel free to yell at me.
In addition: SHPONGLE

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InvisibleShroomismM
Space Travellin
Male User Gallery
Folding@home Statistics
Registered: 02/13/00
Posts: 66,015
Loc: 9th Dimension
Re: Define Life [Re: djd586]
    #1502384 - 04/28/03 09:20 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Consciousness.

Yes, plants have consciousness.


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Offlineblaze2
The Witness
Male

Registered: 12/20/02
Posts: 1,883
Loc: San Antonio, TX
Last seen: 11 years, 8 months
Re: Define Life [Re: Shroomism]
    #1502660 - 04/28/03 10:17 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

life doesnt have to be organic. if a robot was prorgrammed to have a "mind" of its own and could reproduce itself. its life. life has to be able to reproduce. or else it just dissapeers. thats the only constraining qualification i would put on life. peace

blaze2


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"Religion without science is blind, Science without religion is lame." Albert Einstein

"peace is not maintained through force it is acheived through intelligence." Albert Einstein

"Those who desire to give up Freedom in order to gain Security, will not have, nor do they deserve, either one."
Thomas Jefferson

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical." --Thomas Jefferson

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InvisibleShroomismM
Space Travellin
Male User Gallery
Folding@home Statistics
Registered: 02/13/00
Posts: 66,015
Loc: 9th Dimension
Re: Define Life [Re: blaze2]
    #1502664 - 04/28/03 10:18 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

If a robot was programmed to have a 'mind' of it's own, and could reproduce, I would consider it having a consciousness.


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OfflineViBrAnT
WaRpInG &sPiRaLiNg
Registered: 07/30/02
Posts: 286
Last seen: 20 years, 8 months
Re: Define Life [Re: Shroomism]
    #1502720 - 04/28/03 10:33 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

define life, hmmmmmm, life is always changing, therefore we may simply define life as change.


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" liken this life illusory, for your sand castle will one day be adrift amongst the wind "



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Offlineninjahedge
hedge made ofninjas

Registered: 04/14/03
Posts: 58
Loc: here nor there
Last seen: 20 years, 5 months
Re: Define Life [Re: Shroomism]
    #1502752 - 04/28/03 10:42 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

Yes, plants have consciousness. 




how do you know that? or animals, or anyone you know for that matter?  don't i only know that  I  have a consciousness?  couldn't everyone else be robots that seem like real living people?

just wondering  :grin: maybe plants do.


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ow, i poked my brain,
now it's leaking all over...
i guess it's ok

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Offlinethestringphish
vajrayana

Registered: 04/17/03
Posts: 521
Loc: on my way to another plac...
Last seen: 10 years, 6 months
Re: Define Life [Re: ninjahedge]
    #1502869 - 04/28/03 11:32 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

I would say the ability to reproduce is the defining factor of life.

And yes, plants certainly do have consciousness.


--------------------
Ken Wilbur

"this is life changing"

welcomehome

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Invisiblebert
bodhi

Registered: 10/14/02
Posts: 2,819
Loc: state
Re: Define Life [Re: thestringphish]
    #1502886 - 04/28/03 11:43 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

What do you mean 'plants certainly have conciousness'? That's totally unfounded and ridiculous.


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Persons denying the existence of robots may be robots themselves.

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Anonymous

Re: Define Life [Re: bert]
    #1502904 - 04/28/03 11:50 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

No it isn't. A plant is a plant. It thinks it's a plant. But not the thought that we would have if we were the plant - "I am a plant." The thought that makes it grow outwards in the perfect way that it does in whatever direction it grows in. That is it's consciousness.

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Offlinethestringphish
vajrayana

Registered: 04/17/03
Posts: 521
Loc: on my way to another plac...
Last seen: 10 years, 6 months
Re: Define Life [Re: bert]
    #1502908 - 04/28/03 11:53 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

ridiculous? how so? they are multicelled reproducing living organisms just like you and me, the have stiff cell walls so they stay in one place, we have flexible cell walls so we can move, thats the only diference. How could you say they don't? thats closed minded and unfounded, and rediculous. I suggest you open the ol' third eye in a forest or something and talk to some trees. I'm sure they'll set you straight.


--------------------
Ken Wilbur

"this is life changing"

welcomehome

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Invisiblebert
bodhi

Registered: 10/14/02
Posts: 2,819
Loc: state
Re: Define Life [Re: ]
    #1502913 - 04/28/03 11:55 PM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Conciousness is the ability to make decisions. A plant doesn't 'decide' to grow in any particular direction. It grows toward sunlight. A lot of you would get a lot more out of this forum if you actually tried using logic in your arguments. A plant may be 'alive', but life does not equate conciousness. A table can be a rectangle, but that doesn't mean all rectangles are tables.


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Persons denying the existence of robots may be robots themselves.

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OfflineDeiymiyan
I AM

Registered: 04/17/03
Posts: 656
Loc: Within the Realm of Imagi...
Last seen: 14 years, 7 months
Re: Define Life [Re: djd586]
    #1502953 - 04/29/03 12:07 AM (20 years, 10 months ago)

How do you even begin to define something as complex as life with a language as primitive as English? Or any other tongue spoken by man (woman), for that matter...    I'm  :confused:


If I were to place a bet though, I'd bet that LIFE is just the "Tip of the Iceburg" of it all.  :smile:

 


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Dei Gratia de integro,

Veni Vidi Vici:

In Nomine Domini..


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Offlineninjahedge
hedge made ofninjas

Registered: 04/14/03
Posts: 58
Loc: here nor there
Last seen: 20 years, 5 months
Re: Define Life [Re: ]
    #1503008 - 04/29/03 12:25 AM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Quote:

No it isn't. A plant is a plant. It thinks it's a plant. But not the thought that we would have if we were the plant - "I am a plant." The thought that makes it grow outwards in the perfect way that it does in whatever direction it grows in. That is it's consciousness.




wow your ideas of consciousness and thought are way different than mine. you think a plant really "thinks" to grow the way it does? and consciousness seems to me to be the ability to recognize one's own existence and thought. i hardly think a plant has this ability or even has what could be considered thought, but this doesn't mean it isn't alive - my 2 cents


--------------------
ow, i poked my brain,
now it's leaking all over...
i guess it's ok

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Offlinethestringphish
vajrayana

Registered: 04/17/03
Posts: 521
Loc: on my way to another plac...
Last seen: 10 years, 6 months
Re: Define Life [Re: djd586]
    #1503051 - 04/29/03 12:52 AM (20 years, 10 months ago)

"Conciousness is the ability to make decisions"

so if i was wacked in the head by a baseball bat, ended up a vegetable, could still eat, drink and breath, mabey even hear and see, but not have the presence of mind to do anything else, like make desicions, that would mean i have no consiousness? Or if i had a lobotomy, and could no longer make desicions, or do much else besides drool on myself, that would mean i have no consciousness? I disagree. Sounds like a bunch of crap to me.

I belive Consciousness is simply the awareness of being.


--------------------
Ken Wilbur

"this is life changing"

welcomehome

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Invisiblebert
bodhi

Registered: 10/14/02
Posts: 2,819
Loc: state
Re: Define Life [Re: thestringphish]
    #1503057 - 04/29/03 12:54 AM (20 years, 10 months ago)

Alright, awareness of being is another good way to describe it. Still doesn't mean plants have conciousness though, even under that definition.


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Persons denying the existence of robots may be robots themselves.

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