There is a proposal
by cosmologist Fred Hoyle who in 1983 published The intelligent
Universe in which he argued that life was ubiquitous in the
Universe and that intelligence controlled the evolution of that
Universe from within, this intelligence being part of the Universe
and not separated from it. Life has not originated on the Earth but
has settled on it from the outside. The Earth may be viewed as a
kind of mounting platform on which more elaborate life forms are
obtained from more elementary ones. Hoyle emphatically states that
he is not a Christian and does not think he will ever become one.
He believes, like the Greeks, that there is an ultimate,
discoverable order in the universe.
James Lovelock's
view of an intelligent planet Earth is 'Gaia' a living being
evolved as a satellite of the sun, or it may have evolved together
with the solar system as a whole or it may have evolved with the
cosmos as a whole. It may be that the distinction between the above
alternatives is somewhat too sharp. At any rate Gaia is directly
influenced by the solar system and receives inputs from the cosmos,
some of which may not even be known to us. According to the
Gaia thesis, the biosphere together with its atmospheric
environment form a single entity or natural system. This system is
the product of organic forces that are highly coordinated by the
system itself. Gaia has, in effect, created herself, not in a
random manner, what is more, but in a goal-directed manner since
the system is highly stable and is capable of maintaining its
stability in the face of internal and external challenges. It is,
in fact, a cybernetic system and for this to be possible, Gaia must
display considerable order, indeed, she must be seen as a vast
cooperative enterprise, very much as nature was seen by the Natural
Theologists.
If we accept the
Gala Thesis, in which the Earth is seen to be a planetary
system with certain self-regulating features that are controlled by
the combined activities of the biota, such as surface temperature,
climate, oxidation state and acidity, then such acceptance must
profoundly affect our view of Evolution. Life, as Jim
Lovelock has pointed out, is essentially social, and it is
the colligative properties of such associations of life that
characterise planetary self-regulation. And because of the profound
influence that life has had on its surroundings it becomes
inconceivable to divorce life from the environment
itself.
Such a view of the
world of living things is, needless to say, totally incompatible
with neo- Darwinism. Indeed an evolutionary theory that would be
consistent with this view of the world would be the very negation
of neo-Darwinism.
If Gaia is a single
natural system that has created herself in a coordinated and goal-
directed way, then Gaia is clearly the unit of evolution, not the
individual living thing as neo-Darwinists insist.
Gaia is not just a
contemporaneous organization of living things. She is a spatio-
temporal system. Now it is difficult for us to grasp the notion of
a spatio-temporal system, as our language makes a clear distinction
between things and processes and our thinking is clearly influenced
by our language. It is nevertheless essential that we realize that
all living things have a temporal as well as a spatial component.
They exist in time just as much as in space. This means that Gaia
is not only a thing but also a process, and what is that process,
one might ask, if it is not evolution?
If this is so, then
the Gaian process, i.e. evolution, must display the same
fundamental structure that does Gaia when seen as a spatial thing.
If the latter is a biological, social and ecological structure,
then the former cannot possibly be but a mere physical and
mechanical one as the neo-Darwinists tell us; it must clearly also
be seen in biological, social and ecological terms.
But what part of the
temporal process involved must be seen as evolving? We assume that
it must be the contemporaneous process, the one occurring before
our eyes? But how do we justify this assumption? I suggest that the
total process is involved, stretching back into the mists of time.
The reason for suggesting this is that the information passed on
from generation to generation of living things must reflect the
experience of the total- spatio-temporal system involved and not
just of part of it.
This information
appears to be organized hierarchically, the most general
information, that which reflects the longest experience being
particularly non-plastic, the more particular information, that
which reflects the more recent experience being very much more
plastic, and hence more easily adaptable to short-term
environmental contingencies. This arrangement is clearly that which
best assures the continuity or the stability of the
total-spatio-temporal Gaian system. If this is so, this means,
among other things, that evolution is a long term strategy not just
a set of ad hoc adaptations.
If Gaia creates
herself, then the living world must be seen as dynamic and creative
not as passive and robot-like.
