Conventional wisdom has it that life somehow produces consciousness, but what if it's the other way around?
After writing about the Universe being conscious, I really enjoyed reading this perspective on life arising from information processing. As I wrote earlier, consciousness could be regarded as an information field spanning the universe. Life then, emerges from consciousness as a gradual build up of stored information. As more information is stored, more predictions can be computed about the future, giving a higher chance for survival.
The article starts off describing information storage at a biological level, but I was glad to see it go beyond that into physical processes. The late Robert Pirsig also wrote about the opportunistic nature of the universe extending beyond biological evolution. In his second book, Lila, he attributes the reason for life being carbon based on the very nature of the carbon atom. It provides the most flexible combination of valence bonds with other atoms, giving it the highest chance of forming useful molecules. Evolution is therefore only a continuation of a long held practice by the universe to build on what it already has.
Consciousness produces life
After writing about the Universe being conscious, I really enjoyed reading this perspective on life arising from information processing. As I wrote earlier, consciousness could be regarded as an information field spanning the universe. Life then, emerges from consciousness as a gradual build up of stored information. As more information is stored, more predictions can be computed about the future, giving a higher chance for survival.
The article starts off describing information storage at a biological level, but I was glad to see it go beyond that into physical processes. The late Robert Pirsig also wrote about the opportunistic nature of the universe extending beyond biological evolution. In his second book, Lila, he attributes the reason for life being carbon based on the very nature of the carbon atom. It provides the most flexible combination of valence bonds with other atoms, giving it the highest chance of forming useful molecules. Evolution is therefore only a continuation of a long held practice by the universe to build on what it already has.