Dissipative Structures, Organisms and Evolution

Kondepudi, Dilip K.; Bari, Benjamin De; Dixon, James A.

doi:10.3390/e22111305

Cited by 42 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…There is also an issue of whether life's origin (less so its meaning) might have something to do with dissipative structures of the kind that Prigogine [125] described. Dissipative structures are discussed in the context of the origin of physicochemical order, as in Zhabotinsky reactions, and in the context of life [126]. Though skeptical that life could be seen as belonging to a category that would fall under the label of dissipative structures, we can say that living cells might have some properties in common dissipative structures, as the latter only arise in far from equilibrium systems, whereby both living things and H 2 -producing hydrothermal vents are far from equilibrium systems.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

To What Inanimate Matter Are We Most Closely Related and Does the Origin of Life Harbor Meaning?

2021

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The question concerning the meaning of life is important, but it immediately confronts the present authors with insurmountable obstacles from a philosophical standpoint, as it would require us to define not only what we hold to be life, but what we hold to be meaning in addition, requiring us to do both in a properly researched context. We unconditionally surrender to that challenge. Instead, we offer a vernacular, armchair approach to life’s origin and meaning, with some layman’s thoughts on the meaning of origins as viewed from the biologist’s standpoint. One can observe that biologists generally approach the concept of biological meaning in the context of evolution. This is the basis for the broad resonance behind Dobzhansky’s appraisal that “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution”. Biologists try to understand living things in the historical context of how they arose, without giving much thought to the definition of what life or living things are, which for a biologist is usually not an interesting question in the practical context of daily dealings with organisms. Do humans generally understand life’s meaning in the context of history? If we consider the problem of life’s origin, the question of what constitutes a living thing becomes somewhat more acute for the biologist, though not more answerable, because it is inescapable that there was a time when there were no organisms on Earth, followed by a time when there were, the latter time having persisted in continuity to the present. This raises the question of where, in that transition, chemicals on Earth became alive, requiring, in turn, a set of premises for how life arose in order to conceptualize the problem in relation to organisms we know today, including ourselves, which brings us to the point of this paper: In the same way that cultural narratives for origins always start with a setting, scientific narratives for origins also always start with a setting, a place on Earth or elsewhere where we can imagine what happened for the sake of structuring both the problem and the narrative for its solution. This raises the question of whether scientific origins settings convey meaning to humans in that they suggest to us from what kind of place and what kinds of chemicals we are descended, that is, to which inanimate things we are most closely related.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

To What Inanimate Matter Are We Most Closely Related and Does the Origin of Life Harbor Meaning?

2021

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“…Because entropy and free-energy dissipating irreversible processes generate and maintain these structures, these have been called dissipative structures.' (Kondepudi et al, 2020). In short, the presentment of the opportunity in a nonequilibrium state triggers self-organization and actions from the entrepreneurs who will move to dissipate the potential gradient existing in the opportunity to produce a lower entropy state and a stabler system with profit derived.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In short, the presentment of the opportunity in a nonequilibrium state triggers self-organization and actions from the entrepreneurs who will move to dissipate the potential gradient existing in the opportunity to produce a lower entropy state and a stabler system with profit derived. In the study in (Kondepudi et al, 2020) their research revealed that some of these structures exhibit organism-like behaviour akin to the organism-like behaviours in electrically and chemically driven systems. This can be a breakthrough discovery as the behaviours of entrepreneurs is part of pattern formation responding to signals and stimuli.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(Kondepudi et al, 2020, p. 6). Kondepudi et al (2020) studies of non-living dissipative structures have demonstrated a plethora of biologically plausible behaviours. Their bio-analogue dissipative structures (BDS) serve as minimally operative models for biology and a framework for understanding the physical foundations for a physics of organism and evolution of life.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Thermodynamics and Gradient Manipulation Mechanism in Entrepreneurial Actions

Leong¹

2021

IJBM

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Entrepreneurship researches started to have traction at the start of 1980 and underwent paradigmatic shift. However despite the varied veins of exploration from opportunities to innate traits, entrepreneurship literatures have yet developed a unifying conceptualization and theory with key concepts that can clearly explain why entrepreneurs act the way they do? What inspires them to action? What seduce them to move at all? This paper intends to relate the study of entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial actions and activities with references to thermodynamic and energy gradient manipulation mechanism. Studying business ventures from a process view in an attempt to reconstruct the entrepreneurial process by illustrating a range of relevant perspectives from energy gradients in naturally occurring chemicals and suspension coils, this paper hopes to pull together a unifying theory on entrepreneurship basing on the forces at work with thermodynamic concepts and expressions with gradient-manipulation mechanism to explain the entrepreneurial action-motion phenomena. The gradient-manipulating mechanism and thermodynamic expressions thus become the “nature” invisible hand that operates the motion of actions. Kirzner’s theory of entrepreneurship explains the coordination of markets and of knowledge. It is that knowledge, the recognition of the opportunities in the actual imperfect markets that triggers the gradient-manipulation mechanism. The findings of this paper suggest that entrepreneurial actions are force-driven by the lure of profits to select of best pathways and means to achieve the ends. The idea that entrepreneurial actions are the results of the play of forces with thermodynamic forces at work is a powerful suggestion in the finding of this paper.

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“…The release of increasing entropy in the environment is highly facilitated, as the external world is much wider and bigger than a biological object. The increase in entropy outside the system pushes onward the system to go ahead in replicating patterns and creating order [ 64 , 65 , 66 ]. In this sense it goes on dissipating contrasting forces until the system is “frozen” (somehow) in a highly ordered state, where, more frequently, it starts to operate not far from the thermodynamic equilibrium.…”

Section: Chance Necessity and Dissipation: The Concept Of “Nothimentioning

confidence: 99%

Molecules, Information and the Origin of Life: What Is Next?

Chirumbolo

Vella

2021

Molecules

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How life did originate and what is life, in its deepest foundation? The texture of life is known to be held by molecules and their chemical-physical laws, yet a thorough elucidation of the aforementioned questions still stands as a puzzling challenge for science. Focusing solely on molecules and their laws has indirectly consolidated, in the scientific knowledge, a mechanistic (reductionist) perspective of biology and medicine. This occurred throughout the long historical path of experimental science, affecting subsequently the onset of the many theses and speculations about the origin of life and its maintenance. Actually, defining what is life, asks for a novel epistemology, a ground on which living systems’ organization, whose origin is still questioned via chemistry, physics and even philosophy, may provide a new key to focus onto the complex nature of the human being. In this scenario, many issues, such as the role of information and water structure, have been long time neglected from the theoretical basis on the origin of life and marginalized as a kind of scenic backstage. On the contrary, applied science and technology went ahead on considering molecules as the sole leading components in the scenery. Water physics and information dynamics may have a role in living systems much more fundamental than ever expected. Can an organism be simply explained by a mechanistic view of its nature or we need “something else”? Probably, we can earn sound foundations about life by simply changing our prejudicial view about living systems simply as complex, highly ordered machines. In this manuscript we would like to reappraise many fundamental aspects of molecular and chemical biology and reading them through a new paradigm, which includes Prigogine’s dissipative structures and informational dissipation (Shannon dissipation). This would provide readers with insightful clues about how biology and chemistry may be thoroughly revised, referring to new models, such as informational dissipation. We trust they are enabled to address a straightforward contribution in elucidating what life is for science. This overview is not simply a philosophical speculation, but it would like to affect deeply our way to conceive and describe the foundations of organisms’ life, providing intriguing suggestions for readers in the field.

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Dissipative Structures, Organisms and Evolution

Cited by 42 publications

References 64 publications

To What Inanimate Matter Are We Most Closely Related and Does the Origin of Life Harbor Meaning?

To What Inanimate Matter Are We Most Closely Related and Does the Origin of Life Harbor Meaning?

Thermodynamics and Gradient Manipulation Mechanism in Entrepreneurial Actions

Molecules, Information and the Origin of Life: What Is Next?

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