Sketch here b/c late. My human desire, agency. My desire/reason/interactions as rational. Desire for knowledge as being open to reality in all its factors. A desire I share with all rational beings. Key point: discuss how we would judge and interact with a possible alternative rational life form: community/standards higher than culture/moral standards transcending dna preservation etc. would govern such interactions (and judgments). Something desired in community with them. Arg That community having a source (platonic) that is itself an agent. Leader of ultimate rational community. Somethin' like that...
How about defining it as an instance of functional complexity? And treating the list of properties as following necessarily from this definition? Okay, this is very diamond-in-the-rough (or perhaps zirconium...) but here goes my thoughts on the matter: (Complexity) Many diverse parts (functional) acting for the sake of the whole I think I need to add something like "not as the instrument of another" or something like that. Given that they act together as one whole and given entropy, etc., the organism will need to posses more order than its surroundings (homeostasis). It will therefore need to take in energy (nutrition), which it will use to sustain its readiness to interact with its environment so as to preserve its own being (homeostasis again?), but which will eventually break down (death), so that in order for that life form to continue it will need to duplicate itself (reproduction), which, upon occurring, will involve both development (growth) to maturity and...
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