An "autopoietic machine" would be not be a machine as Rosen defines
the word "machine". I am excited about eventually incorporating the
ideas of hyper-sets to see if they add anything new to the ideas of
Rosen. I am curious to see if hyper-sets can be resolved into
components representing the Aristotelian causes. (Material cause,
efficient cause, formal cause, final cause). I find these convenient
when thinking about life.
Onar Writes:
> According to this camp Life is defined on a precise threshold of
> complexity, namely with autopoiesis.
Bruce Writes:
> This is the nub. Here we have, what must be the architypal,
> meta-system tranisition. How does the transition occur? Informally
> we say that there is a qualitative change, something important has
> happened.
Rosen also talks a little about "the origin of life" problem. How do we
get from something that is not alive to something that is alive. How
do we cross the meta-system threshold? This is a tough question. Just
so there are no false claims here, Rosen doesn't (to my knowledge)
give an answer. He points out towards the end of his book (LIFE
ITSELF section 10D) that he sees two possibilities.
(1) that life is a primitive that has no non-self-referring explanation or
(2) that life is the outcome of a larger system and that this larger
system has no non-self-referring explanation as to its origin...thus, the
whole thing boils down to the same explanation given in proposal (1).
Rosen basically offers his theory on what life is. He points out the
"origin of life" issue as the next big unanswered question. He
concludes section 10D of his book with the following quote:
"From our present plateau, we can see this next peak to be
scaled, looming above us. But we are in a good position now
from which to launch an ascent; all the tools are now in our
hands. Indeed, readers do not have to wait upon me; from
where they stand now, they can set out on this journey for
themselves, any time they care to."
It is our natural disposition to want to start with nothing and then
explain how things get here...thus the various religious creation stories
(and the scientific creation story of the big bang). In each of these
cases, there is a necessary agent acting "from outside". This agent
cannot be explained from within the system. The origin of the agent
always remains unanswered.
Where did God come from?
Where did the big Bang come from?
We face the same dilemma in cosmology as we do with the non-
mechanistic definition of life.
Rosen's maverick minority views in biology are analogous to some of
the maverick minority views in cosmology that challenge the big-bang
hypothesis...suggesting instead some kind of infinite steady state
universe...(that the agent somehow comes from within).
Jeff Prideaux