Life

Question 1

What is life

Answer 1

• A definitive and unequivocal response has not been reached.
• Animate has the meaning of living or sometimes that of enlivening or stimulating.

Question 2

Are machines same as living organisms?

Answer 2

Machines function, even perfectly, only in ideal conditions; but living organism, instead possesses an enormous capacity of adaptation?
Machines are inventions of man , life is not- man invents machines imitating the living organisms without perfection. First was life then machines.

Question 3

Scientific information on life

Answer 3

• From scientific point of view, life is a singular organization of matter.
• The difference between living and nonliving is the complexity of the molecular structuralization.
• The living substance is composed of extremely organized and complex molecules.

Question 4

What about philosophy?

Answer 4

Philosophers generally define life as a species of movement.
Rush says that “the essence of life is change, the process, the continual activity”
St Thomas says the name of life is given to a substance to which self-movement and application of itself to any kind of operation belong naturally

Question 5

characteristics of living beings

Answer 5

1. Living beings have “self-movement”. They have inside themselves the principle of their movement. They do not need an external agent to propel them in order to move
2. Living things exhibit a strong unity in themselves. They cannot be divided. They will lose their lives if they were divided
3. Living things are characterized by immanence. They have “interiority”: an internal world. They have actions whose effects remain inside of them. We can perform immanent actions like reading, thinking, desiring, etc.
4. Living things develop: they unfold themselves in time. Living things develop towards a goal: their mature state. They grow
5. Living things go through a rhythmic cycle that is harmonious. They develop by a process that involves repetitive movements. These movements follow a harmonious pattern. Trees sprout leaves, then flowers and then fruits, following an annual or semestral or quarterly cycle. Living things have to feed regularly. Living things have a cycle of activity and rest.

Question 6

Degrees in forms of life

Answer 6

Vegetative life
Sensitive life
Intellectual life

Question 7

Vegetative life

Answer 7

These living things exhibit these three principal functions: nutrition, growth and reproduction

Question 8

Sensitive life

Answer 8

This kind of life distinguishes the animals from the plants. Animals have a system of perception. They fulfill the vegetative functions through the perception of external stimuli and their responses to these stimuli
The responses to external stimuli, in the animals, are governed by instinct

Question 9

Intellectual life

Answer 9

This is the life that is proper to man. In man the closed circuit “stimulus-response” is broken.

Question 10

Characteristics of man

Answer 10

By means of his intellect, a man chooses his own ends. He is not satisfied with the ends of the species (growth, survival and reproduction). He also has personal ends.

the means to achieve his ends are not constant or automatically given. He has to look for them and find them. External stimuli can cause different persons to react in different ways. Each person is unique. He makes “choices” when confronted with problems and needs.