Writing Hamlet is undoubtedly regarded as a brilliant achievement. However, the precise and minute exchange of substances with the environment—a task performed by every cell with remarkable accuracy—is often overlooked. Allow us to shift your perspective.
There is consensus on this: unveiling the fundamental biological processes of life is essential to understanding higher thought. But to what extent? This is where the discussion lies. For Edgar Morin, a pioneer of Complex Theory, self-regulation is the key to this problem. But what does it truly mean to regulate oneself? Is it merely a simple task, or does it hold answers to some of the universal mysteries concerning how life weaves itself?
Here is the first thesis to consider: to be alive is an act of computation.
Right now, when we think of a computer, we imagine a high-capacity calculation machine. However, at the dawn of computation, computers were primarily symbol-processing machines capable of manipulating physical, external, and environmental symbols. Although they follow predefined instructions, computers also possess their heuristics for solving logical problems.
For Morin[1], any computational system requires four dimensions: informational, symbolic, memorial, and logical. The first two are intertwined, as every piece of information is encoded in symbols, and any symbol may or may not carry information. The nuance here is that the computing system must recognize symbols as a language—otherwise, they remain mere noise. Additionally, the computer needs a way to store data and a set of logical rules to process it.
A computer is, above all, not merely an information-processing machine—where information holds meaning only in relation to the processor—but a problem-solving machine. Considered from this broader perspective, any problem-solving entity computes. In fact, computers are just one component within the larger problem-solving systems of living beings.
Life embodies these four dimensions of computing. DNA functions as a symbol decoder and memory device, establishing logical rules for self-organization. Though this computational entity does not “calculate” in the conventional sense, it undertakes the immense task of living and surviving—all while solving problems. By distinguishing between the internal and the external, a living being computes the exchange of substances with its environment.
This is a cognitive activity: life actively discerns shapes and determines which substances can be assimilated. It also detects events and disturbances, transforming them into information to decide whether to approach or withdraw. Unlike machines, however, this decision-making process is inseparable from the living system itself. While machines produce external objects, living systems produce themselves.
In this sense, life is self-generated and inherently fragile, as it sustains itself and reproduces its environment within. Self-organization is, therefore, eco-organization. A living being without external relations is merely a virtual monad, devoid of meaning—to exist is to substantively relate, regardless of what Hume might argue.
Morin cryptically summarizes: “The organization of the living machine is both the product and the producer of its organization: computation produces the organization that produces computation.”[2] The key distinction is that computers solve our problems, whereas living machines have their problems. The former is a tool; the latter is the foundation of life.
Living computation is “…computation of oneself, from oneself, in the function of oneself, for oneself, and about oneself.”[3] If it has not been emphasized enough, self-referentiality is essential to understanding this problem and recognizing certain elementary living beings as active, object-making entities. To compute as a living being is to act as a subject.
Every subject is the center of its world, capable of computing itself while ontologically distinguishing between itself and what is not itself. The subject affirms itself and possesses the capacity for self-transcendence. This “auto-egocentrism” is a defining trait of living beings.
Let us set aside any stale phenomenological implications. Self-organization and self-referentiality are properties of any being capable of distinguishing between inside and outside. Once this differentiation is made, the inside becomes a logical fortress, besieged by external forces seeking its annihilation. To be is to withstand them. The emergence of autoregulation marks the boundary between a mere rock and a decision-making elemental organism. Thus, the true subject is the heroic survivor, solving problems—not the decadent subjects who enthrone humanity as the center of the universe.
Even the most fundamental act of cellular division embodies this computational egocentrism. The two bacteria resulting from binary fission, though originating from a single cell, act as independent, self-regulated organisms—proto-subjects in their own right.
But what precedes what? For Morin, computation does not precede living organization, as both emerge simultaneously within the intricate relational fabric of life. A cell is both subject and object, maintaining its subjectivity within an objectively complex system of organic molecular interactions and specialized cellular functions.
The living computer computes its own computation, distinguishing between the subjective computing instance and the cellular, corporeal self-computation. The cell then integrates this corporeal self as its proper self, forming an I-subject. Finally, the fusion of self with I-itself generates a self that is both subjective and objective.[4]
In layperson’s terms, a living being retains subjectivity while embracing the prior objectivity that constitutes its cellular system. The computing being, therefore, transcends mere objectivity, becoming active and capable of engaging with its environment as an object to be navigated and transformed. As seen in slime mold, self-reference extends to self-exa-reference—an organism’s ability to refer to itself implies a simultaneous reference to the environment as its negation. Auto-eco-organization, then, is the act of being and persisting within an environment that constantly challenges its existence.
However, rather than relying on confrontational metaphors, we might affirm that complementarity, rather than antagonism, lies at the heart of life’s greatest mystery.
Obviously, these computing capabilities cannot be compared to the activity of a central nervous system. However, exploring the fascinating world of plants reveals unexpected forms of computation. Zoë Schlanger highlights intriguing connections between plants and problem-solving abilities that can only be regarded as intelligence. In fact, computation contrasts the complexity of the brain with the collective response of millions of computing cells in simpler organisms.
Since the whole is always greater than the sum of its parts, slime mold colonies can solve seemingly simple yet proportionally complex tasks. The study of these so-called “lower” beings demonstrates how collective entities can tackle problems in ways that cannot be fully explained by merely summing the computations of individual organisms. In this way, although lacking any cogito, computation remains the foundation of all knowledge.
This is, in fact, the wonder of emergence: how lower organisms, acting as a whole and without centralized control, can outperform a single, more developed organism. The extracellular and material activity of slime molds, the cooperative behavior of ant colonies, and the synchronized movements of birds baffle the human eye. Humanity stands dethroned, yearning to reclaim its privilege as the sole arbiter and architect of worlds.
References
Morin, Edgar. El Método III: El conocimiento del conocimiento. Cátedra, 1999.
Notas
[1] Morin, Edgar. El Método III: El conocimiento del conocimiento. Cátedra, 1999.
[2] Morin, 26.
[3] Morin, 26.
[4] Morin, 27.
