A Rational Cosmology: How Life Follows the Laws of Physics

Mr. Reginald Firehammer, in his essay, "Life," presents further arguments against the physical nature of life. But these arguments do not demonstrate his intended point. This essay shall give responses to Mr. Firehammer's claims and demonstrate how it is possible for life to follow the laws of physics.

Mr. Firehammer writes:

"It is not a "system" that is alive. You may think of an organism is a "system," but if it is only the physical system, it is not alive itself. What is self-sustained is the process which uses the physical aspects of the "system" (organism) to sustain itself and the organism as an organism. It requires those physical aspects because a process must be a process of something. In that sense, it also maintains the organism as a living entity. As soon as the process ceases, the physical entity is no longer an organism."

A "process of physical entities" is a relationship among those physical entities whereby, in their spatial, motional, or other interactions, the entities affect each other's qualities. That is all any process is; it is the sum of the entities that partake in it and the attributes and natures that those entities exhibit.

To say that life requires physical entities to be "a process of something" is to concede that the only things life is a process of are physical things, and that life is therefore wholly physical, since a process cannot be defined outside the things it is a process of.

Mr. Firehammer further tries to exclude life from the laws of physical causality:

"I have never said the life process is not subject to the laws of causality, but that it is not subject to physical causality. Cause is determined by the nature of the entity or existent doing the acting. Life does not have mass, a pH factor, a temperature, an electromagnetic state, or any other physical property or characteristic. Since the nature of life and the nature of the physical aspects of the organism share no qualities or properties their natures are entirely different and the specific causes that determine their behavior are entirely different."

It is true that life does not have the measurements Mr. Firehammer had described, just as motion does not have mass, or sound waves do not have temperature. Mass and temperature are qualities of entities, not relationships (or processes, which are types of relationships). Life, being a relationship, has different qualities associated with it, which are qualities defined in terms of how the relationship affects the entities partaking in it.

But this does not mean that life does not follow the laws of physics, especially since all the entities that partake in the process known as life are physical and follow said laws. Mr. Firehammer's mistake is in thinking that the laws of physics are somehow deterministic with regard to all matter.

However, the laws of physics, even in their very formulation, have always been conditional. To paraphrase Isaac Newton, if an object is at rest it will remain at rest unless acted on by an outside force. If a force is acting on an object, it will be equal to the product of its mass and acceleration. If an object is pushed by another object with a certain force, it will exhibit an equal and opposite reaction force on that object. All the laws of physics, properly rephrased, entail an "if"component to them, which renders them conditional on the given situation and begs the question: what brings about the situations wherein these laws can manifest themselves?

It is true that the situation can be brought about by inert matter acting in certain ways in accord to its nature (such as a rock pushing on another rock), but it can just as easily be brought about by a complex system that deliberately seeks to exert forces on inert matter. This system has become so complex that it is capable of exerting forces both on entities external to itself (such as rocks) and internal to itself (such as its own limbs or its own mind).

The life process not only follows the laws of physics, it is essential to bringing about the conditionality requirements for its own components to fulfill the laws of physics in a certain manner. The life process is brought about by physical laws governing its constituent entities, and then becomes complex to the point of governing the conditions in which its constituent entities will be put so that those specific physical laws will apply to those entities as are commensurate with the survival of the organism.

Read other parts of "A Rational Cosmology" by clicking here.