The Animate Matter Hypothesis is a new conjecture in theoretical biology that provides a new physical definition of life, and opens the way for the creation of a quantitative theory of living matter. It identifies the origin — and explains the role — of independent biological motion.
Generally, chemically transforming molecules change shape and move their surroundings. The molecular structure of living cells is regularized in such ways that these molecular motions combine into organized and coordinated collective movements. Consequently, the animate organism generates its own independent actions, by which it manipulates its own body, and performs constructive work on itself and its habitat.
The autonomous movements of the organism carry out several vital functions, the foremost of which is sustaining chemical transformations. The reconstructing body of the cell manipulates chemical precursors, causing new chemical reactions, which then stimulate further mechanical actions. Therefore, life is a specific process of interdependent chemical and structural transformations of ordered condensed matter.
The hypothesis has a significant practical importance. It determines a class of self-sustained transformations of condensed matter related to biological life. It introduces non-biological animate materials that can be used for fabrication of artificial living-like subjects.
The Animate matter hypothesis states that the ability of living organisms to produce autonomous mechanical movements emerges at the subatomic scale.[1] During chemical transformations, valence electrons jump to new molecular orbitals, releasing energy and causing orderly atomic permutations within molecules. The molecular structure of the cell is regularized in such ways that these molecular movements coordinate and combine into orderly collective reconstructions.
In contrast, the transforming molecules in the inanimate matter work at cross-purposes, producing only chaotic Brownian motion. For this reason, the inanimate matter does not perform any constructive work.
The animate matter is ordered at all length scales from the atomic to the macroscopic scale. Accordingly, it generates orderly actions at all these levels. At different scales, these actions perform different vital functions. At the molecular level, these movements control chemical transformations. At larger length scales, the orderly movements of living bodies govern the construction of cellular and subcellular structures. Using its own coordinated movements, the organism reconstructs its habitat, excretes waste products, and extracts new chemical precursors from the environment. At larger length scales, animate organisms sense the environment and generate adaptive responses aimed at their survival and reproduction.
The organism extracts new material and energy from the environment. After digesting a new portion of food, it regains the ability to produce independent movements. The organism will consistently generate new actions for as long as it feeds.
The constructive actions of the organism do not have to be conscious or intentional. The “rational behavior” of the organism is governed by its specifically ordered structure, which determines its characteristic movements. These movements normally restore the structure and chemical composition of the organism. Any significant disturbance of the organism’s structure impairs its ability to carry out vital functions, causing death.
Condensed matter is made of atoms and chemical bonds. At the subatomic scale, it is composed of charged nuclei and valence electrons interacting through electric fields. The animate condensed body will have an “urge” to produce an action if these particles seek to form a new configuration with a lower potential energy. This desire is satisfied by the atomic permutations and alterations of the chemical bonds.
During such alterations, the valence electrons make transitions from higher potential energy states to lower potential energy states. In the process, the falling electrons transform potential energy into kinetic energy, and perform mechanical work on their body. This work is used for the orderly atomic rearrangements.
Therefore, the “free will” of the living organism comes from the attraction between charged valence electrons and nuclei.
In a connected condensed matter body of the organism, the charged particles solve the many-body problem collectively. They adjust their actions to each other, and work out unified integrated actions. While doing so, they take into account all passive constraints and obstructions imposed by the body and the environment.
The living body uses chemical precursors formed by means of random molecular permutations. They are imperfectly packed, and store sizable amounts of potential energy.
Using its own orderly movements, the animate organism reassembles this material, obtaining new, better-packed, lower-potential energy configurations, which cannot be reached by random molecular motion. The living body uses this energy for making new actions and building new orderly structures.
Biology obeys the laws of physics and, in particular, the second principle of thermodynamics. However, the hypothesis implicates that regular chemistry, thermodynamics and chemical kinetics cannot adequately describe biological processes. The reason is that the existing molecular theory considers only random (Brownian) molecular motion, ignoring constructive actions of regularized matter.
In particular, the conventional chemistry presupposes that chemical reactions occur upon accidental encounters of the reacting molecules. In contrast, the biological chemistry must describe chemical synthesis controlled by precise manipulations of matter. The existing chemistry adequately describes “individual” chemical transformations, whereas the chemistry of life should treat the collective chemical transformations.
The conventional thermodynamics and chemical kinetics take into account only non-constructive indiscriminate molecular motion. The physics of life must describe discriminatory reconstructions of precisely arranged material bodies, together with their consequences, such self-stimulated transformations.
From a physical point of view, the new quantitative theory of life will describe systems of active agents, which elaborate cooperative collective behaviors with the help of the common evolving (reconstructing) condensed matter body. This theory should describe the behavior of different living systems at various length scales, from the atomic to the macroscopic scale. In addition to the coordinated motion of transforming molecules, it can explain the collective behavior of multicellular organisms or the emergence of the mind from a neural network. [2,3]
The hypothesis paves the way for the creation of artificial animate matter and free-willed artificial organisms. [4]
From a practical standpoint, one can skip making standalone artificial cells, and go straight to the fabrication of functional structures that emulate the operation of neural networks. The animate-like brains will generate their own desires, solve problems, and make decisions by the laws of biology.
The hardware-realized artificial intelligence will handle complexly structured information objects. The animate-like artificial brain will see the outside world as a connected picture, establishing links and cause-and-effect relations between different events. It will perform calculations at many spatial and temporal levels at ones, starting from the atomic level. The physical calculations based on the electronic transitions are very fast. For this reason, this new kind of artificial brain will be much more productive than any computer-simulated artificial intelligence.
[1] Dmitry Kukuruznyak. The Animate State of Matter Hypothesis. 2020. ⟨hal-02913591⟩
[2] Dmitry Kukuruznyak. The Physics of Life. Part I: The Animate Organism as an Active Condensed Matter Body. 2017. ⟨hal-01575989v2⟩
[3] Dmitry Kukuruznyak. The Physics of Life. Part II: The Neural Network as an Active Condensed Matter Body. 2017. ⟨hal-01575993v2⟩
[4] Dmitry Kukuruznyak. The Physics of Life. Part 3: The Artificial Animate Materials. 2020. ⟨hal-02541236⟩
The Animate Condensed Matter Company; 2021.
Creator: Dmitry A. Kukuruznyak, Moscow Animate Materials Center; 2021.