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Conway's game of life, Conway's (perpetual motion) machine, and Democritus' geometry in motion

Dennett suggests that Conway's game of life can model the workings of organisms and thereby show that they are machines .  But this game (which consists of a computer program controlling how black squares cluster together and interact, with these squares forming somewhat life-like interacting clusters of spots) might also be able to model a perpetual motion machine (we'll call this "Conway's Machine").  If it can, then (given the fact that such a machine would violate the second law of thermodynamics) something is wrong with applying this game to nature, and the claim that it can model life is undermined.

I wonder if the Democritan view of nature (which I like to call "geometry in motion") goes hand in hand with acceptance of the applicability of Conway's game to nature (that is, one it true if and only if the other is as well).  If so, then the Democritan view of nature is likewise undermined by the possibility of a Conwayesque  model of a perpetual motion machine.

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