Life - an Unequivicol Definition

Percy writes: You're rejecting common language anyone would use when describing a continuum, even just a simple blending of white into black. Why don't you tell us what language you would use to describe a continuum from white to black?

See Message 285

So if white is life and black is non-life, then the grey is also non-life, because anything non-white is also non-life in your analogy.

No, you've got it backwards. Grey is not black, so it isn't non-life either.

Grey is between life and non-life.

Despite the contradiction you are trying to make of that, we know that Biology uses Chemistry.

It's like Biology is a derivative of Chemistry.

This can be an interesting and useful concept to use to talk about how life differs from non-life.

You know, it worked for explaining Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity as being a space-time continuum.

I understand that it may hurt your religious sensibilities, but can't you leave those at the door when you're discussing science? If you can't expand what you're willing to accept, and you have been outright rejecting the concept, then you are going to hinder your growth.

That's neither good for your self, nor for the discussion you're trying to have on the internet. Well, assuming you're not just trolling which you have pretty much already admitted.

I have said before, you can have life and chemicals as your continuum with the grey being anything in-between.

Fine, that'll work for me.

Can you see why trying to draw a line in the grey to say that this is the point where chemicals become life would be a foolish endeavor? It would be like trying to draw a line on the continuum to say that this is where white becomes black.

AlphaOmegakid writes: See Message 285

I answered your Message 285 before you even wrote it, see Message 275.

--Percy

The definition identifies the "self contained entity which is a contiguous system " as being alive or not. The definition in your example identifies the organism as a whole as being alive. It does not require that all the contiguous parts of the system be alive. They may or may not be.

So parts of an organism can be dead and the organism is still alive ... got it.

At what point in the continuum of 100% totally alive and 0% totally not alive do you count the entity dead or not-alive? Is a person with one living cell and thousands of dead cells still "alive" by your definition?

Is a living hair follicle pulled out with a hair a living entity, including the hair?

How about when the entity becomes similar to a virion in meeting your definition?

Protein enzymes. See https://en.wikipedia.org/...ntral_dogma_of_molecular_biology for basically what I mean.

Which doesn't really answer my questions. You break forum guidelines by posting bare links without saying what in that link applies.

Curiously I note that it starts with:

quote:

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The central dogma of molecular biology is an explanation of the flow of genetic information within a biological system. ...

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So are you saying it must be a biological system to be considered life? A biological system is based on life, so your definition is circular and begging the question if this is what you mean. The whole article is laced with reference to existing life, so your definition is ending up with saying it is life if it has life in it, which is begging the question.

Please clarify.

Back to the questions, can I assume from your answer that:

1) by "genetic process" -- you mean "chemical reactions" Yes No

(2) that "synthesized" -- is just more chemical reactions Yes No

(3) that by "requiring the transfer of information" -- you mean transcription, where "a particular segment of DNA is copied into RNA (mRNA) by the enzyme RNA polymerase" Yes No

... (a) that polymerase is one of the enzymes you talk about, Yes No
... that it would have to be present as well for this process to occur Yes No

... (b) are there other enzymes that are being included without being named? Yes No

... (c) that this is just another chemical reaction Yes No

(4) by "synthesize enzymes" -- are you talking about protein enzymes being made Yes No

Please note that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RNA_polymerase states that

quote:

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... RNA polymerase enzymes are essential to life and are found in all organisms and many viruses. In chemical terms, RNAP is a nucleotidyl transferase that polymerizes ribonucleotides at the 3' end of an RNA transcript.

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So your definition (a) requires something "essential to life" to be life (begging the question?) and (b) it is chemical reactions.

Enjoy

No, I'm afraid I understand exactly what a continuum is, but you don't. quote: Continuum...a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are not perceptibly different from each other, although the extremes are quite distinct. Google

And you still don't get it.

First that definition is not saying that the extremes are different from the middle rather than part of it.

Try this: a 10" wide continuum with white at one edge and black at the other. Cut 1" off each side and you have an abbreviated continuum between very light grey and very dark gray, but they are both grey and the extremes are still quite distinct.

You can keep cutting strips off until you reach a point where the extremes are not very distinct.

How does that happen?

Enjoy

This paragraph states my claims clearly. But apparently you have a low reading comprehension or you ignore my argument completely. A virion outside a host cell is non-living by my definition. When a virus enters the cell, it is the cell that is alive, not the virus by my definition. The virus is a poison to the cell. The virus causes the cell to multiply the chemical poison. The cell explodes and the non-living chemical poison is released into the environment. At no time, and unequvically does my definition declare a virus alive.

But then where does the bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis fit into your definition? This is a obligate intracellular pathogen that cannot survive outside the host cell. This is due to the fact that it lacks the ability to synthesise nucleotides, which are required for not only the formation of ATP and NAD but also in order to replicate it’s own genome. These components required for metabolism and cell division it must extract from it’s host cell. Of course this bacterium eventually needs to infect other cells, so it forms elementary bodies which are metabolically inert, that will survive the external environment. These burst out of the host cell, killing it.
And just out of interest there are viruses, such as Hepatitis B and C, which produce virions without killing the host cell. It is actually the immune systems reaction to the virus presence that results in the host cells death.

Then we have Mimi virus, one of the largest viruses discovered, which has a genome of 1,181,404bp with 979 protein-coding genes. These include genes which were previously thought to be only encoded by cellular organisms. As a comparison, the Chlamydia trachomatis genome is 1,042,519bp long with 894 protein-coding genes.

I would like to know why you place so much significance on ATP? It is just a currency within the cell to transfer energy from exothermic reactions to endothermic reactions. Even the molecule itself is cobbled together from individual molecules common in the cell i.e. the adenosine (or guanosine in GTP) nucleotide base and phosphate backbone from DNA.

Final question is, if an organism is capable of completely taking over another organisms protein synthesis mechanisms, does it need to produce it’s own ATP?

Percy writes: All of these make perfect sense in their particular context. If the context is bodies of water, then harbor/non-harbor and ocean/non-ocean make perfect sense. If the context is wealth, then rich/non-rich and poor/non-poor also make perfect sense. If the context is geography or geology then foothills/non-foothills and mountains/non-mountains make perfect sense. And if the context is life then living/non-living makes perfect sense. Apparently to you living/non-living and life/chemicals are distinctly different opposites. I don't mind using the term life/chemicals, if that's what it takes to help the discussion move forward, but I don't agree with you that living/non-living is a completely different beast, and I don't think anyone else does, either.

Apparently you and Cat Sci do not understand mutually exclusive words. For a moment, let's forget about the concept of a continuum and just use two words, "atheist" and "non-atheist". The set of atheists is the set of all people who meet the definition of atheist. The set of non-atheists is all other people in the world who do not meet the definition of atheist. So who is not included in those two categories? NO ONE! In the case of the continuum, this becomes nonsensical.

Using "Life" and assuming there is an unequivocal definition of life, then all members of the life category are those candidates that meet the definition of "life". The candidates that don't meet this definition fall into the category "non-life". There is no grey in between. Only black and white, and the distinction is clear.

Your earlier objections had a completely different basis, nonsensically mixing "obvious" and "arbitrary" in ways that no one else had, and insisting that your nonsensical statements were identical in meaning with other people's when they were clearly not.

Well you clearly said that

Percy writes: We do have opposite ends of a continuum. A dog is obviously living. A block of lead is obviously non-living. Some things inhabit the region between living and non-living, like perhaps prions and viruses.Message 155

From your declaration I already realize the problem with the use of the mutually exclusive terms used for the "opposite end". Your argument is nonsensical from the get go. Then you talk about the illogical "region between living and non-living". You are correct that the distinct edges are "obviously alive and not alive. There just is no grey area from your own words.

Then later you say:

Percy writes: The ambiguity lies in the middle, not at the endpoints, and in the middle is where your attempt at a definition of life fails, because anywhere you draw the line between what is living and what is not is ultimately arbitrary, and inevitably it will be uninformed by what we do not know.Message 171

The problem here is that you think the definition of life lies in the middle. It doesn't. On any continuum the edges are distinct ("obvious"). The synonym for distinct is "clear", "well defined", and "obvious". Which is exactly how you defined life in regards to a dog. So somehow, in your mind a dog is "obviously' "defined" as alive. And that definition lies at the "end" as you say. Then you make your nonsensical statement in contrast to this by saying that "anywhere you draw the line between what is living and what is not is ultimately arbitrary". This makes no sense in relation to your prior comments.

So sarcastically, I put the two words together, and you immediately recognized it as nonsensical. That's why I put them together, because it is exactly what you are arguing. Nonsense.

The only way the continuum logically works is if you leave "life" undefinable, "fuzzy" and grey. Then the endpoints must be something other than "life", because the end points are clearly defined. This is what everyone is missing. And this is why this argument doesn't work as previously stated.

The only way this argument works is to say that life is undefinable and grey and on the left portion is a dog in the whiter area of grey and on the right side is elemental chemicals and black. Anything left of black is "alive" at some undefinable level. But none of this makes sense in Biology either, so I don't think any of these analogies work, even though as you say they ar in the common language which doesn't justify their use.

Post modernism is also in the common language even though it is logically incoherent. These things become emotionally accepted when the logic breaks down.

However, if "life" is definable and clear, and "obvious" as I argue, then there can be a "chemical evolution" from chemicals to life. And viruses and prions and self replicating molecules might have some relative location in the grey area, but they will not be "alive", and they will not be elemental chemicals.

This makes complete sense!, but it makes it difficult for OOLers. Tht's why they like equivocation and want to leave "life" undefinable., so they can win people's emotional side even when their logic fails.

RAZD writes: First that definition is not saying that the extremes are different from the middle rather than part of it.

So White is grey and black is grey. OK, now I understand it like you do!. Gobbledegunk!

You can keep cutting strips off until you reach a point where the extremes are not very distinct.

And would it still meet the definition of continuum? Yes No

quote:

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Continuum...a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are not perceptibly different from each other, although the extremes are quite distinct. Google

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How does that happen?

Well, it doesn't happen in a continuum. The edges are always quite distinct, "obvious", and "definable".

I guess with you it happens by ignoring the definition. Maybe? Yes No
Just a possibility? Yes No
Do words really mean anything anyway? Yes No

quote:

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Continuum...a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are not perceptibly different from each other, although the extremes are quite distinct. Google

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You quoted it but you don't seem to understand it: Black and white are distinct but gray and gray are not perceptibly different.

Imagine a room with one wall painted black and one wall painted white. Black is different from gray because you've hit he wall. White is different from gray because you've hit the wall. Everything else in the room is gray.

I think you need to consider the context of the terms. Microsporida are cells and can survive (live) for some time outside of a host. They do produce a small amount of ATP during Substrate-level phosphorylation.

This does not seem to be correct. From what I have read Micosporida lack mitochondria and have only mitosomes. Mitosomes are incapable of producing ATP even by substrate-level phosphorylation. In fact the article goes on to say about a particular parasite that it does not have its own method of ATP product.

So is this parasite alive by your definition?

https://books.google.com/books?id=LsPkO1fMPvQC&pg=PA220&l...

All life comes from pr-existing life The law of Biogenesis

There is no "Law of Biogenesis." What is true is that maggots and bacteria do not form directly out of non-living materials. That's all that Paschal and others could show from their experiment.

Beside that, I thought the Bible said that humans and animals were created directly from non-living materials. Do not both science and the Bible agree that the origin of life was from non living materials?

The problem here is that you think the definition of life lies in the middle. It doesn't. On any continuum the edges are distinct ("obvious"). The synonym for distinct is "clear", "well defined", and "obvious". Which is exactly how you defined life in regards to a dog.

Again this argument is specious. Identifying that there are obvious examples of life does not define life as not applying to some non-obvious examples. Seriously, is there doubt about whether a new born puppy is alive? Does that mean mean that we might not have doubt about some other putative organism? Of course not.

What you are trying to argue here is that not only is there a firm definition about what constitutes a living organism (namely yours), but also that alternative views on the subject are not even possible. Clearly that's BS. We already have definitions that have some ambiguity.

ringo writes: You quoted it but you don't seem to understand it: Black and white are distinct but gray and gray are not perceptibly different. Imagine a room with one wall painted black and one wall painted white. Black is different from gray because you've hit he wall. White is different from gray because you've hit the wall. Everything else in the room is gray.

Now apply this to the analogy. Life is one wall. Chemicals the other wall. The gray in between. Fine. So all the things in the grey are not white or are not life.

Yes, I understand this exactly like you do.

Now apply this to the analogy. Life is one wall. Chemicals the other wall. The gray in between. Fine. So all the things in the grey are not white or are not life. Yes, I understand this exactly like you do.

But all this leaves me wondering once again what the point of your definition is. One end of the continuum has life. Everything to the right of life is non-life. But then when we take a example infinitesimally to the right of life, we have some non-life that is much much much much more similar to life than to most of the rest of existence. It is, in fact, identical to life in almost every way, but differs ever so slightly from one of your arbitrary conditions. It is much more similar to a lot of life-forms than these life-forms are to other life-forms. If I wanted to study this thing, I'd do so in the same way I studied the lifeforms to which it is almost identical.

Nonetheless, by the strict AOK definition, it's not life. Great. What I can't see is how that fact is of any practical or theoretical use.

Edited by caffeine, : No reason given.

It is much more similar to a lot of life-forms than these life-forms are to other life-forms. If I wanted to study this thing, I'd do so in the same way I studied the lifeforms to which it is almost identical.

Exactly! You nailed it.

Nonetheless, by the strict AOK definition, it's not life. Great. What I can't see is how that fact is of any practical or theoretical use.

His definition is just a troll's argument. No biologists are going to use his narrow definition because we realize that tying our own hands behind our backs will not lead to new discoveries.

The only reason (besides being a troll) that he is tilting at windmills so hard is a misguided attempt to make whole areas of promising research off limits to origin of life studies.

It will never work. So far he has convinced no one.

AlphaOmegakid writes: Apparently you and Cat Sci do not understand mutually exclusive words. For a moment, let's forget about the concept of a continuum and just use two words, "atheist" and "non-atheist". The set of atheists is the set of all people who meet the definition of atheist. The set of non-atheists is all other people in the world who do not meet the definition of atheist. So who is not included in those two categories? NO ONE! In the case of the continuum, this becomes nonsensical.

"Atheist" is a good example. There is no more an unambiguous definition of atheist than there is of life. From Wikipedia on atheism:

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Writers disagree on how best to define and classify atheism, contesting what supernatural entities it applies to, whether it is an assertion in its own right or merely the absence of one, and whether it requires a conscious, explicit rejection. Atheism has been regarded as compatible with agnosticism, and has also been contrasted with it. A variety of categories have been used to distinguish the different forms of atheism.

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Skipping all your nonsense about continuums and moving ahead to where you finally comment on my expression of willingness to adopt your terminology:

However, if "life" is definable and clear, and "obvious" as I argue, then there can be a "chemical evolution" from chemicals to life. And viruses and prions and self replicating molecules might have some relative location in the grey area, but they will not be "alive", and they will not be elemental chemicals.

Life cannot be defined unambiguously, as the absence of agreement with your definition makes clear. As we saw just earlier, you're not even consistent about whether biologists agree with you or not (they don't). Check out Wikipedia's definition of life ("there is no unequivocal definition of life"). Even if we knew all the steps from raw chemicals to life today, we would still be unable to pinpoint precisely where chemicals became life.

--Percy