I think jar nearly has it. At least, its very close to my own formulation.
I started from the observation that due to entropic decay, water always flows downhill by the fastes available route. And yet, our hearts pump water up, against gravity. This can only be resolved against the laws of thermodynamics by recognising that the total energy that the organism uses to pump blood against gravity must be less than the total energy lost by the system overall.
An organism, them, is a kinda standing entropic wave. It is an interface, like waterfall, between high and low entropic states. A waterfall both does and does not exist in certain sense, but it certainly persists.
Our existance is more complex than the waterfall, but is essentially a whirlpool in a continual flow of energy in a multitude of forms. Because this system is, overall, entropically efficient and hastening the heat-death of the universe, the universe tends to produce highly organised structures if they can produce an overall increase in entropy as a result. Life is a long term investment by the universe in its own demise.
Edit: this reoslves the 'waste' issue. Waste is not a meaningfully ctaegory, but the output of entropically decayed matter is. It doesn't matter if this stuff is then used by something else; entropy always wins. As they say about thermodynamics: you can't win, you can't break even, and you can't get out of the game.
This message has been edited by contracycle, 08-05-2004 08:25 AM