Alive

How alive are we really. There are many things that are living, but you wouldn't say they are really alive. Ex, a tree is living but it's not really alive. So when would you say your truly alive. You can't really remember anything in your first year of life, so whose to say you weren't anymore living than a plant. So when do you truly become more alive than just a living organism.

Discuss.

 

a tree is alive, anything that you can say "is living" is alive. Your prespective of alive, deals with inteligence and memory, a machine is capabale of recording and knowing your every movement, does that mean its alive? it is possible for it to know more then you, all about you ect. It is not alive. its your own oppinion on what alive is. Depending on someone's religion, they might not even be "alive" until they are dead, or fulfilled their "cause" being "alive" is different from person to person

 

Tell me, where is the line between life and non-life?

 

what is your line? it depends on the what the person thinks about being alive.

If you want to go with the basic definition of "alive" then alive would be anything that continues to grow. A person in a coma or a "vegetable state" could be considered alive, as thier body continues function.

non-life would be anything that was one alive, and now is dead. Any substance that was never alive, such as metals ect. also do not have life.

 

Is a virus alive?

 

I'm not sure, I'm trying to recall virus from my biology class.

 

It's RNA encapsulated in a protein shell. All it does is replicate itself by "hijacking" cells.

 

since its capable of free movement and continueing existance wouldn't it then be considered alive?

 

As you wish.

How about a strand of proteins that are encoded with the instructions to replicate themselves?

 

No, I don't wish =]


You seem to know alot, what your oppinion on them? I would think that there are instructed to replicate themselves, they might be nothing more then messangers, simply not attoned to survival, but only to help the creature that they are in, or are forming to survive

 

Anything with a working concions is living i think , or atleast a brain.

 

Are bacteria then not alive?

I think that the following list (taken from Wikipedia) is adequate:

1. Homeostasis: Regulation of the internal environment to maintain a constant state; for example, sweating to reduce temperature.
2. Organization: Being composed of one or more cells, which are the basic units of life.
3. Metabolism: Consumption of energy by converting nonliving material into cellular components (anabolism) and decomposing organic matter (catabolism). Living things require energy to maintain internal organization (homeostasis) and to produce the other phenomena associated with life.
4. Growth: Maintenance of a higher rate of synthesis than catalysis. A growing organism increases in size in all of its parts, rather than simply accumulating matter. The particular species begins to multiply and expand as the evolution continues to flourish.
5. Adaptation: The ability to change over a period of time in response to the environment. This ability is fundamental to the process of evolution and is determined by the organism's heredity as well as the composition of metabolized substances, and external factors present.
6. Response to stimuli: A response can take many forms, from the contraction of a unicellular organism when touched to complex reactions involving all the senses of higher animals. A response is often expressed by motion, for example, the leaves of a plant turning toward the sun or an animal chasing its prey.
7. Reproduction: The ability to produce new organisms. Reproduction can be the division of one cell to form two new cells. Usually the term is applied to the production of a new individual (either asexually, from a single parent organism, or sexually, from at least two differing parent organisms), although strictly speaking it also describes the production of new cells in the process of growth.

Some of these do not apply all of the time, such as reproduction. I would consider an infertile human to still be life.

 

Viruses are not alive, they are also not free moving. Viruses are just DNA, no other traits of life, such as any metabolic processes involving h2o or o2 are observe din viruses.

 

That is what the whole discussion is about, when are we more "alive" then a plant or animal. When are we more "alive" then a person in a coma.

 

What you are saying is that when something has the power to move at it's own will, it's considered living?

I think antything that subsists from the earth is considered living.

 

shouldn't this be an easy asnwer. If you want to know when you feel more alive then a plant or animal or being in a coma, is when you maintain steady brain function, giving you thought process, ability to move, feel emotions ect.

 

It may be hard to understand a concept that is unknowable to us (like a fourth spatial dimension), but I ask, why does it have to be a line?

 

As you start to go into the uncertain area between life and non-life, you must have a line. You can hardly have something that is partially alive.