[EvaH (OP)]

Dinesh asks:

If atoms are the building blocks of everything, then what makes living beings different from non-living things? In brevity, what is life?

What do you think?

[Bored chemist]

Iife is an emergent property.
You can analyse  a brick any way you like, but you won't find any "house" in it.

You can even look at the stack of ten thousand bricks  waiting on a building site, but you only get a house wen  you stack them together with cement in the right layout.

Being a house is a property that emerges out of nowhere when you assemble  the bricks in the right pattern.
(and a bomb can remove that property).

Being alive is a property of some arrangements of atoms.

[evan_au]

what is life?

One characteristic of life is that it represents a temporary, local, decrease in entropy (when viewed from a certain angle).

A bacterium can take disordered matter, and convert it into more bacteria, identical to the first (hence producing more order, from the viewpoint of the bacterium).
- Another observer may see this same event as part of the decay of a blue whale, which might be seen as an even larger and less local decrease in entropy...

Another characteristic of life is that it involves the transmission of information - in the case of a bacterium or a blue whale, this information is encoded in its DNA.

[yovav]

What do you think?

According to my worldview, if we are doing  "zoom out" on life in a crude way, we can notice two things that together make up life.
The desire to have the filling.
2. The filling itself.
In short: the meal is not tasty if I am not hungry. This life is the same combination points between the filling and the desire to receive the filling.
If the same object that had a desire to receive the filling did not exist, then those fillings would not exist either.
Our mind does not perceive reality as it is but is in an imaginary world where the gap between the existing and the desired provides it with a desire for movement, and movement creates in it the effect of time.
It follows that if all fulfillments and desires were in oneness, place and time would not exist.
And life? Would move to another phase.

[Bored chemist]

In short: the meal is not tasty if I am not hungry.

No.
Have you never met the experience of not being hungry- until you see the dessert trolley.

[yovav]

In short: the meal is not tasty if I am not hungry.

No.
Have you never met the experience of not being hungry- until you see the dessert trolley.

This I have not argued but that what determines pleasure is not only the pleasurable object but also the preparation to receive it.
That is, there is a connection between the size of the vessel and the pleasure.
There is the recipient in the thimble and there is the recipient in the bucket, depending on what you prepared.

[Bored chemist]

In short: the meal is not tasty if I am not hungry.

No.
Have you never met the experience of not being hungry- until you see the dessert trolley.

This I have not argued but that what determines pleasure is not only the pleasurable object but also the preparation to receive it.
That is, there is a connection between the size of the vessel and the pleasure.
There is the recipient in the thimble and there is the recipient in the bucket, depending on what you prepared.

It may be a language thing, but that makes no sense.

[yovav]

It may be a language thing, but that makes no sense.

Go talk to someone who had kidney stones, he will tell you how much pleasure there is in urinating.

[Kryptid]

the meal is not tasty if I am not hungry.

Then I think you are an exception. A chocolate bar definitely does taste good to me even if I'm not hungry when I eat it.

The desire to have the filling.

There are plenty of living things that don't desire anything. Bacteria, for example.

[evan_au]

A chocolate bar definitely does taste good to me even if I'm not hungry when I eat it.

A comedian once commented that the meal is not over when his plate is empty.
The meal is only over when he hates himself.

[alancalverd]

Life, like beauty, is an abstract noun which is only defined as a property that we ascribe to certain objects that we call living (or beautiful). We can define a living thing as a dynamic array that tends to homeostasis in response to a stimulus.

[evan_au]

There are plenty of living things that don't desire anything. Bacteria, for example.

I think that Bacteria do have genetic drives, to find water and nutritious food, discard wastes, avoid toxins, stay at a comfortable temperature, and reproduce.

You can even do experiments to find the relative priorities of these drives - for example by placing food at a higher temperature, you can work out the relative priorities of finding food and staying at a comfortable temperature. And these relative priorities may change depending on how long it is since the bacterium last fed.

You could consider these as a chemical-driven will.

In humans, the will is a little less direct, since the chemical balance (eg glucose levels in our blood) impact our subconscious, which then modifies the priorities in our conscious mind.
- With the addition of learning and memory, we developed agriculture and shopping malls that are just less direct ways of finding food more efficiently, and responding to the chemical balance in our bloodstream.
- Airconditioners and refrigerators are a technological way to balance the conflict between avoiding uncomfortable temperatures, avoiding toxins and finding nutritious food.

[yovav]

There are plenty of living things that don't desire anything. Bacteria, for example.

I disagree.
Although he willingly says in a low degree that at the moment we are not perceived as a desire because we describe a desire as something else. But it still exists. If there was no desire there would be no movement.

[yovav]

A comedian once commented that the meal is not over when his plate is empty.
The meal is only over when he hates himself.

An interesting sentence that requires thought

[Kryptid]

I think that Bacteria do have genetic drives, to find water and nutritious food, discard wastes, avoid toxins, stay at a comfortable temperature, and reproduce.

That's a given. I would not call that desire, though:

"desire; noun, a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen."

Bacteria are not conscious. I wouldn't consider chemical reflexes as desires.

I disagree.

Given the definition of the word "desire", something that is not conscious cannot experience it.

Although he willingly says in a low degree that at the moment we are not perceived as a desire because we describe a desire as something else.

I can't parse this sentence.

If there was no desire there would be no movement.

Reflexes say otherwise.

[yovav]

It does not mean desire but about the will.
There are many terminology for the word will.
It is not a matter of free choice or a will related to cognition but to the form in which matter exists.

[yovav]

Reflexes say otherwise.

Because having a reflex is a will. It is indeed an unconsciouswill but it is still a will.

[Kryptid]

Because having a reflex is a will. It is indeed an unconsciouswill but it is still a will.

I don't think that fits the definition of "will". Quote the relevant definition from a dictionary if you disagree.

[Bored chemist]

Reflexes say otherwise.

Because having a reflex is a will. It is indeed an unconsciouswill but it is still a will.

No.
Sneezing is a reflex and it's fairly common to try to avoid sneezing. So which way is the "will" acting- to sneeze or  not to?

[evan_au]

So which way is the "will" acting- to sneeze or  not to?

Conflicting drives are common.

Add in longer-term concerns like the desire to not spread Coronavirus, or to keep your moving car in the center of the lane, and the number potential conflicts increase.

I think that the presence of conflicts does not negate the idea of a will.

But how you try to resolve these conflicts is important.
- Do you go with whatever feels best at the time?
- Or do you draw on experience and remember that this resolution did not turn out so well last time?
- Or do you think ahead to the potential outcomes and use that to guide your decision?
- How to weight the desirability of different potential outcomes then comes back to ethics

Naturally, you don't have time for much contemplation to control a sneeze - perhaps long enough to sneeze into an elbow instead of the person in front of you...
- That's why communication and advice in advance can sometimes lead to better outcomes
- Humans have long had some control of their breathing - speech communication is, after all, a modulation of our natural desire to keep our blood oxygen levels within a narrow range.