[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so very much for your wonderful essay-post, dearest sister in Christ!

In any case, the Shannon model would seems to apply to whatever case we're looking at. That is, whether from the standpoint is of the machine (e.g., "chasing", as defined by a program or algorithm) or of biological systems (relentlessly non-algorithmic "life"), "efficient cause looking to impress material cause because that's what formal cause specifies and final cause requires" is the rule applying to both. And to inorganic nature also.

Indeed!

I'm very pleased to hear that Rosen is at the top of your list of great ones! He certainly got my attention as well.

For the moment, most all of the Rosen-speak is between you and me. But I expect as the concepts have a chance to sprout and grow, we'll pick up a few more correspondents.

After all, the subject "what is life v non-life/death in nature" seems to come up a lot around here.

[CottShop]

[[For the moment, most all of the Rosen-speak is between you and me.]]

Well it wouldn’t be if you two would speak something other than Swahili :) Having trouble following your lines of htought- I think that Rosen was stating that living systems aren’t to be compared to mechanical or software due to ‘chasing’ which occures when the programs search for the best answers (and protect the ‘species’ or program by isolating it from errors that would otherwise affect living systems??) is this correct? If so, that’s about hte bottom line of things as GA’s certainly can’t mimic living systems, and end up artificially protecting the ‘evolving’ systems, and artificially introducing elements not seen in nature such as far greater rapid development minus the negative effects seen in nature.