Everything we see, everything we experience, everything that exists seems to be moving toward its end. Seemingly, everything that was once ...
Everything we see, everything we experience, everything that exists seems to be moving toward its end. Seemingly, everything that was once brought into existence will cease to exist. Can anything exist forever? What could be the theoretical conditions for eternal existence?
There are things that can exist forever. An electron, for example, can exist forever. At least until it meets a positron, at which point they turn into photons. A photon can also travel for billions of years and exist until it transfers its energy and is absorbed by a suitable particle. Atoms also have eternal life, as long as they do not encounter conditions that can transform their structure, as happens in stars.
Seemingly, the condition for eternal existence is the permanence of internal states in an environment that is not capable of changing that setting. This is the trivial condition, and the trivial form of eternal existence.
However, things change in the world. A system behaving in a way that corresponds to the trivial form of eternal existence is, in fact, already a dead world, one in which nothing can change. The trivial form of eternal existence is irrelevant as a thing that exists.
It is only interesting to think about eternal existence when conditions actually change, both externally and also internally, that is, when the eternally existing system is a changing organization that exists in a changing environment. The real question regarding eternal existence is therefore whether there can be a system that can maintain its existence indefinitely, even in a changing environment, that can also change over time within itself, i.e., that is capable of continuous change in practice while maintaining the coherent nature of its organized structure.
We do not usually consider eternal existence in this defined form. In its classical form, eternal existence is the existence of a structure that can survive indefinitely even in a changing environment. An eternally existing system that is not inherently dead must necessarily be capable of internal changes. However, it is also apparent that such a system, which has a fixed state of existence and is capable of internal changes, is, in fact, a system in equilibrium, which can only exist in a closed form of different states, moving only around the equilibrium, the possibly available states of a fixed existence. Although such an eternal system is capable of change, its various states can only change in limited ways defined by the equilibrium. Such an equilibrium system, capable only of limited changes, does not differ fundamentally in nature from the trivial, dead form of eternal existence.
The non-trivial, practically non-dead form of eternal existence is therefore the unlimited existence in time of a coherent structure whose internal states can form an open set, i.e., actually a non-equilibrium system. Can such a system exist, and what are the criteria for its existence?
The description of non-trivial eternal existence corresponds to the state of eternal life imagined and desired by us. This is no coincidence, since such stable, non-equilibrium systems are in fact the living systems, hence, the unlimited persistence of the living state is the sought-after form of eternal existence.
For example, we imagine eternal life as a state of eternal youth, but not as a passive, unchanging state, rather as something that actively interacts with its environment, experiences new things, and is able to react and interact in new ways with the environment, meaning that the internal state also changes while retaining the characteristics of youthness. The eternal life, imagined by humans, is also an active state of eternity. Can such a state exist, and what are the criteria for a real eternal existence?
In theory, it is possible, and there are no theoretical limitations to the human body remaining in a state of youthness, as this is constantly pursued by individuals having resources trying to extend lifehood. All that is required is to reverse every change in the body that leads to aging. With sufficient energy can be called money, knowledge, and technology, there is no theoretical impossibility of achieving this in practice.
The state of eternal existence in the form of life is theoretically possible even for humans. In this case, however, the main question is what is the system that maintains eternal existence as a whole, i.e., what is the complete system that is actually needed to be the infinitely existing system, which can maintain its internal cohesive structure indefinitely? Can eternal existence, for example, apply to an individual human being, i.e., whether a human being is capable of maintaining its human existence indefinitely?
It must be stated here that the system that would enable unlimited existence for an individual human being is a system that is significantly more extensive than the given individual human being. Cooperation of many, many people must interact together in order for one person to have eternal life. In the case of an immortal human being, the related system is in fact necessarily not the individual human being, but an entire group of cooperating human beings, an entire community, practically the whole society. Individual human beings cannot be immortal on their own.
The possible length of an individual's existence, as a relevance searching for an eternally existing system, hence loses its meaning, and the relevant question is transferred to a higher level, that of society. Is it possible for a society to exist eternally, and if so, under what conditions?
First of all, what is society? Society can be defined as a community consisting of individually living components that are held together by cooperation, and consequently, the components acting together create new properties specific to the system. In this sense, the human body is also a society, a cooperating community of living cells, which are not even just human cells.
Although, as we discussed before, theoretically possible, practically, a human being is not a system that can be considered to exist forever in reality. The process of natural evolution, as generally manifested itself in the development of the human body as well, definitely does not favor the eternal existence of individual life, as evolution implements mechanisms dedicated to processes whose goal of functioning is the programmed end of existence of the complex living organisms. Obviously, the eternal existence of an individual being is not advantageous in natural evolution.
It can be deducted, however, that the central element of natural evolution considering existence is not the individual living being, not even the different species that can also be considered a state of life. The central element of natural evolution is the whole biosphere, the cooperative community of living species, while the biosphere in itself can also be viewed as a living state. A biosphere, through the natural evolutionary processes present, is able to exist indefinitely, albeit not without limits, still within a wide range of possible conditions, as the biosphere of the Earth can also demonstrate.
So what conditions are necessary for eternal existence? A potentially eternal system is a structure formed by living systems, a society that is capable of functioning in an evolutionary manner, functioning through evolutionary mechanisms, adapting to changes in the environment.
The human body, hence for example, does not fit into this definition. Although it is a living system, also a society made up of living cells, but the human organism itself does not function in an evolutionary manner. However, species, including the human species, do function in an evolutionary manner. Species can exist for a potentially unlimited time within a specific range of conditions, as can the evolutionary biosphere formed by the living systems of species.
However, the true unlimited eternal existence is even more than that; it is something that can exist for an unlimited time by being capable of adapting to practically any circumstances. What additional conditions are necessary for true eternal existence to be attained?
Biology on Earth maintains life through the well-known biochemical processes of natural evolution. These chemical processes have physical limits, and if these limits are exceeded, the system breaks down and can no longer function. These are the objective limits of biological existence. Natural evolution, based on chemical reactions, is incapable of overcoming the limits that make the biochemical processes of evolution impossible, even though it is capable of adapting to a wide range of conditions, as for example in the case of mammals, where evolution has resulted in the stable ability of the internal temperature of the organism over an extended temperature range.
However, the human species has already overcome numerous biological limitations. For example, individuals of the human species are capable of existing in space. The conditions in space are obviously unsuitable for biological life to function. In fact, in the adaptive process, human society did not adapt biochemical processes to function in space, but rather brought the conditions necessary for biochemical processes into the space environment, creating a suitable oasis in space where the human body can continue to function. This type of adaptation is somewhat similar, for example, to what happens naturally in mammals' adaptation to different environments.
Although this human activity aimed at extending living conditions is not a natural extension of the operating conditions of evolutionary biochemical processes, it is nevertheless a form of evolutionary adaptation, the process can be called directed evolution, which mechanism is increasingly employed by the human species. The human species is increasingly adapting to changed environments not through the mechanisms of random natural evolution, but through the processes of directed evolution guided by goals recognized by human intention.
Human evolution at the level of society representing the human species is increasingly adapting to the environment through directed evolution, and is developing in an increasingly directed manner through the accumulation of information characteristic of evolutionary existence, i.e., it is creating an increasingly complex structure, an increasingly complex society. This increase in complexity is a natural law of evolution, in which the living state extends the limits of its existence through the results of accumulated information.
And the intentional expansion of these limits could one day create a non-biochemical existence, the steps of which, for example, can already be seen in the development of artificial intelligence. Sooner or later, the human race can and will transcend the limitations imposed by biochemical processes and, by potentially extending the boundaries of its existence without limit, will potentially create a state of truly unlimited existence, though certainly not in its current biological form.
So what is the further, the final necessary condition for unlimited existence? The presence of directed evolution, i.e., the ability to solve problems intentionally, the presence of intelligence guided by reason.
The necessary and sufficient conditions for unlimited eternal existence are therefore that a society composed of living individuals adapting through evolutionary processes possesses the ability to solve problems guided by the mind, i.e., possesses the ability of reasoned intelligence.
A corresponding question is: on what level of intelligence is it necessary to appear and be present for a system capable of eternal existence? In the case of the human species, this level, where intelligence is appearing, is the human being. Humans are intelligent beings, yet human society is much more intelligent than any individual human being, i.e., it has a much greater problem-solving potential. Human cells, as living units, certainly do not have intention-driven problem-solving abilities, while the organization of human cells, the functionality of the brain created through differentiation and integration, possesses an intelligent mind, that is intention-driven intelligence, which continues to develop in potential during the process of organizing into society.
It is interesting to note that even an ant colony possesses a certain level of intelligence. In the case of ant society, the cells that make up the ants certainly do not have problem-solving abilities, and most likely neither do individual ants, but a certain level of intelligence emerges, created by natural evolution, during the functioning of the ant colony. However, even at the level of the ant colony, there is certainly no presence of intention, which is essential for the functioning of directed evolution.
It is also interesting to observe in human society that intention exists not only at the individual human level, but also at the community level, as well, which can, in fact, become the determining factor in the direction of changes in human society, especially in democratically functioning human societies. At the level of human society, a common intention that develops in the community is formed in an emergent manner, rather than by intention guided only by individual human minds. However, it is demonstrated that even this emergent intention enables democratic societies achieves greater potential in the long term, more effectively achieving and maintaining a possible state of eternal existence than in the case of autocracies, which are controlled in a dictatorial manner by the individual will of certain members of society, and hence demonstrated in practice to be destined to cease to exist in the long run.
The fundamental determinant of directed evolution is the causal intention of the intelligent mind, which necessarily includes the presence of self-awareness, which may have developed during evolution precisely because of this advantage. However, self-awareness is not only a prerequisite for the presence of causal intention, but also plays a unique role in the existence of eternal existence. The recognition of existence was born in the universe with the emergence of self-awareness. Any system capable of eternal existence, i.e., an evolutionary structure consisting of living building blocks with problem-solving capabilities, without self-awareness, is merely a state of existence without recognition. Without self-awareness, any existence, even eternal existence, is merely a state, a futility without recognition.
Obviously, humans possess self-awareness, as do many other kinds of animals with sufficiently complex brains, but biological cells certainly do not possess self-awareness on their own. Self-awareness is a property of brains that have evolved to a suitable level of complexity.
According to the criteria listed above, of all the organizations we know, only human society is capable of eternal life without limitations, the existence of which can be recognized by the human beings who make up society possessing self-awareness. The final thought-provoking question is whether human society itself can possess self-awareness, that is, whether human society itself can recognize its own existence, whether a structure capable of potentially true eternal existence can be aware of its own existence?
To find the answer to this question, we need to consider what the conditions for the existence of self-awareness are, what conditions a society must meet in order to possess self-awareness, and whether human society can meet these conditions.
We do not have a definitive understanding of the mechanisms behind the appearance of self-awareness in the brain, but it is obvious that the brain, the society of neurons that make up the brain, possesses the capacity for self-awareness.
We already have a great deal of knowledge about how the brain works. The brain fundamentally is a dynamic and plastic network of neurons that cooperate through their activity. However, the same can be said about human society as well, as many other different cooperative systems can operate on similar principles. (This is why, for example, we can and we are pursuing the artificial realization of self-awareness.) We do not know exactly what specific characteristics of cooperation create self-awareness in the brain, but it is highly probable that whatever these characteristics may be, a society of cooperating humans can, in principle, also be capable of forming similar interactions that create self-awareness in the brain.
Does the human brain have self-awareness? Yes. Can a system that functions identically to the brain have self-awareness? Obviously. Can an artificial system that functions identically to the brain have self-awareness? Certainly. Can human society have its own independent consciousness?
This question concerning self-awareness can therefore also be phrased as follows: is it possible for there to be an operational structure and mechanism within human society that corresponds to the operational processes of the brain that result in self-awareness? In theory, why not? Would this potential also enable society, at the societal level, to recognize its own existence?
Currently, the collective will of human society is undoubtedly forming in an emergent manner, with the help of community decision-making mechanisms without the presence of social-level self-awareness. What kind of will could a human society with independent, self-aware consciousness have? How could a human society function if it were awakened to its own independent existence? The potential of human society's intelligence is greater than the potential of individual human intelligence. How would human society's self-awareness affect intelligent behavior at the societal level when intelligence is no longer guided by a common will formed in an emergent manner, but rather by a communal self-awareness that has recognized its own existence? How can the many individual human self-awarenesses and wills connect with and even contribute to the will and self-awareness of human society itself?
Ultimately, how can it connect, or even contribute to, what can arise from the many individual consciousnesses, wills, and intelligent potentials forming an even bigger society capable of existing indefinitely that has awakened to a common self-awareness? Is this perhaps God? If so, could we also become part of God at some point, in some form? Exciting questions await answers.
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