Life: As We Know It

The concept of life, its origin, its evolution has baffled religious and scientific thinkers alike since the existence of humans. In the midst of conflicting theories intertwined with logic and doctrines, one thing we know for sure that, life exists on earth because life can exist on earth, but what defines life anyway?

Life, as we know it is the amalgamation of varied processes that takes place within a mass, such as metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, reproduction, etc., ultimately leading to death. But how did this “Life” thing happen on a non-living body?

Earth is everything what the definition of life isn’t. It doesn’t eat, don’t grow, doesn’t reproduce, nor it reacts to pain or shows any emotions. Earth is a mere bearer. It may not be “alive” in itself but it provides certain ingredients that enable a varied number of masses to thrive i.e. develop certain features that are distinct from the nonliving masses. Earth is unique. It has life. It just got lucky. The perfect distance from the sun, almost the right size, right surface temperature, it’s weird how only this planet possesses any life and others don’t (well we don’t yet know, do we?), at least in our solar system. So, is it just that earth happens to be "in the right place at the right time?", and, any planet or bearer with just the right recipe can bear life? Or is Earth the chosen one? 

The fundamentals required for life may not be the only fundamentals which may create, sustain, and develop life. It’s not a universal truth. For example, recipe for making cake may differ from person to person, some may use eggs, some don’t, and some may prefer a chocolate base, some caramel. People even bake the cake on different temperatures, but ultimately it's cake, it's eatable and it’s yummy.

Conditions vary, from extreme cold on the Antarctic to extreme heat of the vast Sahara, the fundamentals are completely different, yet life exists on both. Our understanding of life is based on our needs and our requirements. A polar bear will not survive the extreme heat of Sahara, it doesn’t mean life can’t exist there, it means the fundamentals of life required to live in Sahara is meant for a Camel not a Polar bear.

 Life on earth exists because the condition it provides makes it possible for a certain kind of life to exist. There may be some other planets, scattered throughout the vastness of the universe, which may support a completely different form of life. Conditions of some may be exactly identical to that of earth or may even hold exactly same life forms, but on different timelines (monkeys there are yet to become humans or the humans have already evolved into meta-humans) as that of earth. In the end, all it comes down to an energy source (nucleus) “not too overwhelming”, and a resilient bearer (atoms!) that is capable of absorbing energy from the energy source without getting engulfed into it for at least, a certain period of time.

 What do we know about life? Life comes in various forms, shapes and sizes. From microscopic single celled Amoeba to the gigantic Blue Whale, from Sea Urchins to Venus flytraps, life is multifaceted, resilient and perennial. It exists in one form or the other. Our ignorance about other forms and fundamentals of life doesn’t make it nonexistent. Kind of like God, isn’t it?