| Life is present all around us- Let science search | 2 comments |
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21 May 2008 @ 06:30, by Shreepal Singh
Life is present all around us - Let the science
search it in its own way
What we have here on earth is abundantly present there in the universe surrounding us on all sides, except a single and unique thing that we call life. This all-inclusive totality of things that we know existing and their abundance of supply all around us – here on earth and beyond it in universe – are so complete and universal – without a single exception save life – that there seems a scientific law of abundance operating in Nature. Speaking positively, this law states that every thing in universe is supplied by Nature in abundance and – negatively speaking – that there is nothing in universe which is unique because of its singular presence.
The evidence in support of this law of abundance is overwhelmingly consistent in Nature. One may turn to any entity available in Nature to find its abundance; subatomic particles, atoms, elements, their chemical compositions all are available here on earth and beyond earth in universe in abundance.
And, there is no exception save life to this universal phenomenon; there is no single breach save life of this seemingly scientific law of abundance. Yet, life as we know happily thriving here on earth is the single breach of this law.
We have sufficiently advanced science and technology at our command today, which is able to detect life – in the form we know it – in its primitive evolutionary stage as well as the highly developed one that might be present at some far away place in universe. With the advent of radio communication, we have been frantically searching Extra-Terrestrial life for the last half century with the fond hope that after all life on earth should be not so unique in its presence. But all in vain. We have put all suppositions against us in this goose chase; we have assumed life is a rare happening in universe because it needs extremely delicate balance of environment to create and support this phenomenon. Since we know life is there on earth, we assume that a similar life elsewhere on other places in universe would need a similar set of circumstances; so we are searching in the wide universe life’s so-called tell-tale signs – the right range of gravity (size of planets), temperature (distance from star), chemical compositions of atmosphere, presence of carbon, water etc. etc. We have already assumed – much against the universal law of abundance – that in our search we are looking foe a needle in a proverbial hey stack. Yet, we have not been able to find life any where else in this extremely vast universe, which we now comparatively know with sufficient details.
It is very interesting to deduce logical conclusions – and which conclusions are quite depressing in their impact on life, which in effect practically means us humans – from the negative results of our scientific search for ET life. Today, we are sure that there is no life around us to the distance of at least a few thousands of light years. This much is definitely known to us. If we apply this distance of non-availability of life as a rough estimate to the entire universe that is known to us today, then the conclusion would be that life might be available, if at all, in extremely short supply perhaps at a few score of places in the entire universe, known and unknown both. This means we – and that includes all our inferior cousins on the evolutionary ladder as well – are, if not alone, lonely in this otherwise abundantly rich universe. This is a depressing thought to the extreme. Our common sense rebels against such thoughts; it could not be so in our otherwise abundant universe.
It all looks illogical. Is there some thing amiss on our approach to the problem of ET life and its search? Law of abundance tells us that we should be terribly wrong some where in our approach. Our instinctive common sense – which does not always rely on reason – also prods us to think that in the face of such universal abundance of every thing, it cannot be the case; that it is not possible that in this otherwise abundant universe life is without supply or in exceptionally short supply; that there is something seriously wrong in our approach to the problem and in the direction of our efforts. Could it be possible that life – at least theoretically similar to the one we know on earth – is present all around us and in abundance? If it is so, could we develop scientific tools to communicate with this ET life in our midst?
There is really need to think this way; there is need to change our approach; there is need to change the direction of our efforts in the search of ET life. We are in real need to adopt a new approach to the old problem of ET life and their supposed UFOs. Why should we confine our search to detect in far away places in universe (planets, satellites) things like carbon, oxygen, suitable elements and their compounds like water, and all else that are definitely necessary to sustain life here on earth? This is wrong approach to the problem. These requisites – which are supporting life on earth and hence are considered telltale signs of life elsewhere – are not the fundamental requirements of a life that may have spectrum broader than earth-life. Such a broader life would include earth-life as one of its many forms. This broad life would require four elements: firstly, a fundamental principle for its operation; secondly, its necessary components; thirdly, its various models or different possible combinations of these component parts; and lastly, an isolated and self-contained body fluid or ‘an integrated medium’, which could ‘house’ these three elements. Such a life would be material (and not spiritual) and have many kinds totally different from one another, though operating on the same fundamental principle.
We know only one model of life, that is, earth bound living beings’ families. Life is a system organization; it cannot be studied as an isolated event. In human body there are many systems and subsystems of life operating in tandem with one another. Living beings, their internal organ, cells and genes have their own life. Complete body as a single unit also has its own life. All these subsystems combined into a grand system have a particular model of life. This is not the only one model of life that is possible. There may be many more possible models of life. We may draw many more models parallel to our earthly life. Genes, in the form of DNAs, have a complete chemical code of life. This code is nothing but a particular ‘order’ of the two pairs of AT and GC in the DNA helix. The fundamental mechanism of storing the life program, or coding, is not the particular chemicals of DNA but the ‘order’ of these pairs. If you change the order of these pairs from one kind to another, you have a different code of life and then this new code would create a new form of our earthly life. Can this way, the chemical way, be the only one possible way of creating order or coding instructions for a life program? No, it cannot be so. What is crucial is the order and not the medium of this order. In computer software we code instructions of a program, which is not life program, by two electric quantities. There we have two entities and we create a definite order of them, which carries instructions of a program. This program could even be (to begin with) of a (simple) life; if we make an open-ended computer software that performs certain dedicated tasks (like self-preservation, self-duplication, domination of its surroundings etc.), then learns from its mistakes committed in countering unforeseen odds present in the operating environment and thereafter self corrects these mistakes by making necessary amendments in the initially given software, what we would have will be a simple program of life. We can draw a parallel of a new kind of life where the medium of creating this order is other than chemicals. We should look to find in our universe possibility of similar coding or ‘order’ with the aid of different kinds of media, which are available in universe in plenty.
Such an approach to the problem would indicate that a life is essentially a program of which instructions are coded. Looking at the problem from this approach, it is apparent that all forms of life must have a similar program but the instructions to execute this program may be coded by utilizing altogether different materials. We cannot limit this coding by the use of only chemical compounds that are familiarly used by DNAs of earth-life. However, there cannot be many differing programs for different kinds included in such a broad form of life present in universe. And, the mode of instructions executing the program of life would depend on the kind of materials used in the code; therefore, there must exist very many modes for coding these instructions (this supposition in favor of multiple modes is in accord with the law of abundance because there are many kinds of materials in abundant supply in Nature). In essence, these instructions must remain the same in different kinds of life to a mathematical precision but still their modes should be so different that they may look a totally different things altogether, that is, beyond any recognition of similarity. In some cases, a mode of these instructions may even look a phenomenon of inert world and we may not be able to recognize any sign of life in its operation, which in reality it might be there. In one case, this code may be structured by using chemical compounds, as we said is the case with DNA of earth life; in another case, it could equally be structured by using atoms, or even subatomic particles, as medium of code, which are in abundant supply like chemical compounds. And, it all could very well be ‘housed’ in a well contoured isolated and integrated energy field of a particular shape. In still another case, this code could be structured by using assemblies of stars and planets in the like manner; the list of materials which could be used as medium of instructions in a code of life may turn out to be really long; and the only requirement there for materials to be used as medium is their abundant supply in universe.
In this approach a program would determine the behaviour and the fate of the given kind of life. And, there we can definitely recognize the signature tune of life and define it in the broadest scope. This approach implies that any and every kind of life must be programmed in such a way that when its coded instructions are executed, its outcome should be an exhibition of common properties of life. What are these common properties of life? These could be enumerated thus: firstly, there must be a process of change that looks like birth, growth and death; secondly, there should occur an intake of energy from an outside source (this outside is only a relative term), which propels this process of change, that looks like food consuming and thirdly, there should happen a multiplication of the given system as additional beneficial outcome of the change-process, which may look like the procreation of the living being. These are the only common properties of life that should define it. Then, there is another very important question of its evolution. Because life is a process that looks like a struggle against deterministic regime of inert world around it, in its fighting strategy change is brought in the working mechanism of these three common properties that is termed by us ‘evolution’. This evolution, this change over a period of time, would make these three common properties of life no more so simple as to recognize them instantly by applying our standards of earthly life; evolution would bring great innovations in them making them greatly complex, which could turn out beyond our comprehension in wildest dream.
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Category: Articles
2 comments
7 Jun 2008 @ 16:32 by a-d : Let's stop kidding ourselves!
STAR DUST!....that's another --a little more poetical-- name for that Life Phenomenon; that "substance" that makes (up for ) Life!....
In Life, all there is is is LIFE!!!... (Only) Man dreamt up death as well as destruction of entities-of- Life, made by that Life(/God)
If you see the phenomenon Life as a sphere ( a "ball") ; the closer to the center/core you come; the LESS death/destruction there is (/can be) hence; the FARTHER away from the Center; the more destruction/death/--or what Human (/ Mainstream) science like to see it as: "Natural evolution of "Things" can be found there.
Travel to the CORE of that Life-Sphere and there is NO DEATH, NO DESTRUCTION, NO "EVOLUTION" by these Means!
2 Jul 2008 @ 07:43 by shreepal : Center of life
a-d,in my opinion you are absolutely right; if we suppose life a sphere, at its center there is nothing but life, that is, there is no death or destruction there. But the problem is we (and we means here whatever we humans are, made up of our thoughts, likings etc.)are not able to reach that center, except in the instances of exceptional individuals. The crux of all human activities (and not humans alone but all forms of life away from center - and in my opinion every thing else here on earth and elsewhere in the universe)is a slow movement towards that center. This movement at the human level means his or her thinking process and many more human things like love, compassion etc; at the lower animal level (lower only from our relative point) this movement means animals struggle for survival and many more things like love and sacrifice for its offsprings. In fact we are yet away from the center and therefore there is death and destruction coupled with life. Language and its constructs -ideas - are not always sufficient enough to convey the truth of the matter and therefore sometimes there seems confusion and contradiction on a given subject.
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