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意識のはじまり  作者: 安田孫康
48/58

10 Possibility for explaining the movement of living things

10 Possibility for explaining the movement of living things


  An expected possibility of explanation about the substances's movement in a living body

  (Digression) The development and evolution of organisms based on autopoiesis




  ................




  《 An expected possibility of explanation about the substances's movement in a living body 》


Even though the movements of organisms appear to violate the macroscopic laws of physics, but, if the place where those movements occur is an environment (space) having physically peculiar characteristics --for instance, an environment having physical characteristics specific to organisms--, it may not necessarily fall into a violation.


It's because, in such an environment, it can be that the macroscopic laws of physics are not applicable. Or, because physical laws else than the macroscopic laws of physics are applied too. It can just be that that's what it's supposed to be there.


It may be evaluated to be the physical laws in that environment (having physically peculiar characteristics specific to a living body) --so to speak, biologically microscopic laws of physics specific to the internal space of a living body-- else than the microscopic laws of physics in the microscopic world of elementary particles. And, since a living body can, in a sense, be regarded as an extremely peculiar quantum, it doesn't seem to be so odd. (Since the intelligence (= consciousness) which is strongly expected to emerge in a living body must be an integrated body which has comprehensiveness, it can be regarded as a kind of extremely peculiar quantum).




  《 (Digression) The development and evolution of organisms based on autopoiesis 》


This universe is said to be about 13.7 billion years old.


And, it is said that about 4,567 million years have passed since Earth was born.


By the way, the length of time of 100 million years is tremendous. 10 million years is also tremendous.


100 years is 1 century.

1,000 years is 10 centuries.

10,000 years is 100 centuries.

100,000 years is 1,000 centuries.

1,000,000 years (1 million years) is 10,000 centuries.

10,000,000 years (10 million years) is 100,000 centuries.

100,000,000 years (100 million years) is 1,000,000 centuries (1 million centuries).

1,000,000,000 years (1 billion years) is 10,000,000 centuries (10 million centuries).

10,000,000,000 years (10 billion years) is 100,000,000 centuries (100 million centuries).


And, the diameter of the Milky Way galaxy to which our solar system belongs is said to be about 100,000 light-years. (The radius is about 50,000 light-years). And, it is said that our solar system is located about 30,000 light-years from the center of the Milky Way. This implies that it takes 30,000 years for light departed from our solar system to reach the center of the Milky Way. It's a surprise. Even light needs 30,000 years (300 centuries) to fly to the center of the Milky Way. The Milky Way galaxy alone is that vast.


Moreover, it is said that, on Earth, there were many events of enormously long period of time, in which geological environment, climate, composition of air, etc. changed on a large-scale and organisms evolved over a long period of 1 million years or 10 million years as a unit.


This is, so to speak, "everything is impermanent" on a geological scale. ("Everything is impermanent" on a scale of universe too). Everything can never remain the same. And, we are seriously surprised with the enormousness of the period of time. There is no time limit in this universe and, from a perspective of natural time, everything changes and disappears in an instant. Only energy (and matter actions embodied by energy) last. (However, surprisingly, it is said that there in Superstring theory in physics is even a hypothesis that this universe is 50th universe).


And, it is said that unicellular organisms were born about 1 billion 67 million years after the birth of Earth and about 3.5 billion years ago. Moreover, about a billion years ago, multicellular organisms emerged. Organisms have survived without cease for 3.5 billion years, undergoing many evolutions and extinctions. Unicellular organisms alone are about 2.5 billion years --25 million centuries--. It's unbelievable.


Dinosaurs appeared in the late Triassic period of the Mesozoic era, about 231.4 million years ago, and have survived for about 160 million years. This too is unbelievable. Dinosaurs without technology have survived for as long as 160 million years, without devastating the ecological environment of Earth. No matter how many days had passed, the dinosaur era had continued on and on, endlessly, day after day. It's not a story of 100 or 200 years. It's a story of 1.6 million centuries. The lengthiness is nearly eternal for humans who live in a daily, monthly, or yearly basis. Dinosaurs survived throughout so exorbitant period of time. However, it is said that the huge and ferocious dinosaurs subsisted only at the end of the dinosaur era. And dinosaurs became extinct in the late Cretaceous, about 66 million years ago.


It is said that the genus Homo appeared as a different species in Africa about 2 million years ago. And, it seems that the modern human being, Homo sapiens, appeared about 400,000 to 250,000 years ago.


And, since its appearance, humankind has survived unsophisticatedly without advanced technology, up to the Industrial Revolution that began in modern times.


(By the way, 400,000 years is equivalent to about 4 times the diameter of the Milky Way which is 4,000 centuries).


However, technology has evolved rapidly since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and mankind now has such a mighty power that it can destroy the ecological environment of Earth in a mess. It was achieved in just 2 centuries. It's only 1/20,000, 0.005% of the lifetime of Homo sapiens.


By the way, it may sound persistent, but the lifetime of dinosaurs is 1.6 million centuries. That's 800,000 times 2 centuries after the beginning of the Industrial Revolution of humans. Dinosaurs had survived for a terrifyingly long period of time.


Compared to that, the survival of humankind since recorded history seems to be nonexistent.


However, conversely, it also feels like something is terribly condensed in human activity of this 2 centuries or so. Someting seems to have sprang into bloom at a stretch and have reached its golden age. It may be, for instance, like creativity aiming to shape advanced order.


And the active movement of all living things in the 3.8 billion-year history of living things on Earth was based on the heat generation in cells and autopoiesis which is fundamentally caused by heat. If autopoiesis was not possible, substances wouldn't have evolved into living things and continued to evolve.


By the way, it seems that the natural formation of (material) consciousness --intelligence-- through the reduction of entropy production rate is the fundamental basis and cause of autopoiesis. Thereby, not just the formation process of crystals, the natural formation of inanimate material consciousness may be commonplace on Earth. It's only that the effect is usually invisible. (This is because no one thinks that consciousness (intelligence) emerges in mere substances. Because such an idea is egregious).


And, there is a possibility that, regardless of active generation of heat, inanimate material consciousness emerges naturally wherever there is heat outflow or cooling. For example, it seems that sudden glitches such as data transmission errors are extremely reduced in cooled electronic devices. This may be a work of material consciousness's intention of forming physical order. (However, it's also conceivable that the increase of kinetic energy of substances is the cause of malfunction).


(Though a cell is highly organized, it is fundamentally an aggregate of innumerable substances. In that point of view, a cell doesn't differ a bit with machines and general aggregates of substances. Thereby, if consciousness is formed in a cell through the reduction of entropy production rate, it's not at all strange if consciousness is also formed at machines and general aggregates of substances. This is because consciousness is a single gigantic ideological action formed from infinitesimal ideological actions inherent in innumerable constituent substances and its formation doesn't need close chemical bonds of constituents. Though consciousness is an extremely peculiar quantum, it's not a single material quantum. And, there is no essential difference between living consciousness of living things and inanimate material consciousness).


Moreover, even in Earth, its entropy production rate seems to reduce as a whole. This is because, heat is generated by nuclear fission inside Earth, but that is radiated toward the sky from the surface of the earth. Then, we cannot help thinking of a possibitily that a single enormous material consciousness (intelligence) has emerged throughout the earth. It can hardly be imagined what consciousness it is and what effect or influence it has.


The formation of material consciousness through the reduction of entropy production rate is a natural phenomenon. So there is no point in asking whether it is good or bad. However, that became the foundation of autopoiesis, and substances became free of restrictions by the (known, macroscopic) physical laws --Newtons's laws of motion, the fundamental interactions, the law of the conservation of energy, etc.-- and became able to move externally and actively based on their own thinking --computation, design--. Because of that, tremendous history of organisms has been developed thus far on Earth.

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