Yes, in this universe, life as we know it is a salmon of order swimming up the waterfall of entropy, every flick of it tail powered by its shit fouling the river, because life in this universe is spec'd to the constraints of this universe. But perhaps we can't find the aliens because they have tunnelled out, off to another gentler universe where they grow forever in n dimensions of time and space pondering the beauty of all the integers.

This is lovely but why would they leave their home? There are very unlikely to find another place equally comfortable to the one in which they evolved.

That's a good question Ted.

> Life exists because it increases the entropy in the universe

Life causes entropy, but do you literally mean it exists because it increases entropy? I don’t see the connection, only that life causes entropy. Can you explain?

Not a great answer but basically everything that occurs in this Universe must increase the overall entropy of the universe (second law)

Of course local entropy can decrease, hopefully in a way that is beneficial to our little corner of the universe :)

Would recommend Schrodingers “what is life” if interested further in life/entropy

> Life exists because it increases the entropy in the universe

This is an concise idea I sit on quite often.

Is this a commonly known idea? Among scientists/engineers/philosopher types? Would appreciate other thoughts.

This subject is discussed in the pop sci work of PBS spacetime https://youtu.be/GcfLZSL7YGw with reference to articles and books if you're looking for more

I think so, I've gone back to university to study biology, and I'm encountering two complimentary perspectives on what life is, a pragmatic classification version that says: ok - of the things that we see which ones are alive and which aren't and what are the distinguishing characteristics? and a second definitional version, blending Schroedinger and Shannon, that says life seems to be information propagating itself, but we're not going examine you on that in first year genomics.

Yes, we taught this during course 3 thermo @ MIT. The mystery is how the hell the universe started at such low entropy.

We can predict the final total maximum entropy of the visible universe, we are about half way there. Life produces entropy, but not as ’efficiently’ as exploding stars.