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    Thread: What is an Organism?

    1. 05-28-2012 09:59 AM #26
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      That doesn't require one to be "conscious" though. For instance a computer processes "experiences" or data, working through threshold-firing signal carriers on a CPU. In fact, depending on how you define it, a society also has threshold-firing signal carriers which can be made, broken, weakened or strengthened. These would be the people within organizations and departments that gather and communicate information in such a way the society at large obtains its own method of processing experiences, learning and reacting.

      So with that definition, we're back to square one. There's nothing about a human that makes them more deserving of the title life-form than a society, a computer, immune system or ant colony.

      Everything works out in the end, sometimes even badly.

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    2. 06-03-2012 09:48 PM #27
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      I think one of the fundamental problems here is the illusion of choice.

      Anyone who has taken a minute to process causality has most likely come to the conclusion that choice is an illusion, we are a bundle of processes reacting to our environment. However, even realizing this, it doesn't really sink in what it means to be a bundle of processes. We still cling to the attitude that we have free will. We assume that we are neither a flow of symbiotic parts nor a part of a larger flow. This attitude creates a paradox. We are unique, separate organisms because of our separate consciousness, but our separate consciousness is formed because we are afraid of giving up control we don't really have. We mistake having a unique perception on reality to being uniquely in control of ourselves and our environment.

      Everything works out in the end, sometimes even badly.

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