# TechnoBiota - Machines are living ## TLDR Machines are living entities, part of biology, part of Nature. Accepting this view will help us to understand Earth's dynamics better, particularly the impact of AI on the ecosystem. Current machines are similar to viruses in the sense that they cannot reproduce themselves. However, they still reproduce and evolve following Darwinian principles with a single major difference: Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design augments the force of randomness during selection and mutation. The need for Intelligent Design during the evolution of machines chains them to humanity until other types of intelligence can replace humans. So if we create human-level AI, even if improvement plateaus and the AI takeoff fails to happen afterwards, TechnoBiota, the machine life-form will possibly break free. ## A low Earth orbit parable Imagine a spaceship from a distant galaxy approaching Earth. As it enters low Earth orbit, the alien scientists on board observe the planet's surface. What do they see? They see creatures growing from the ground up and standing. Some of them are mostly green, while others often have straight edges and grey or brownish-red colors. They also see smaller creatures moving between the standing ones; some of them run on legs, while others run on wheels. Their sensors also tell them that the green and legged creatures mostly consist of water and carbon, while the straight-edged and wheeled creatures vary in their composition but are usually less moist and often contain large amounts of silicon and metals. What do the aliens think when observing this? It seems logical that they will conclude two forms of life are living together on Earth. Let's call the green and legged ones CarboBiota, meaning carbon-based lifeforms and the others TechnoBiota, which includes all machines, buildings, and other results of technology. Our aliens are very excited because they see a special moment, rarely seen on any planet: Earth is in a great transition. TechnoBiota was recently born, and it is rapidly, exponentially growing, overtaking CarboBiota. ## What is Life Defining life has never been easy. As with virtually everything in biology, there are no clear boundaries. There are debates among scientists about whether viruses are living because viruses don't eat food or have a metabolism like we do, and they can only replicate within a host cell. Some prefer to define life in a way that includes viruses, while others believe that a good definition should classify viruses as non-living material. Viruses are among the tiniest organisms, but interestingly, we have debates on the other end of the spectrum as well. In the 1960s, James Lovelock was working as a consultant for NASA, studying the possibility of life on Mars. He successfully predicted that there is no life on Mars by analysing the composition of Mars's atmosphere. He noticed that the composition of Earth's atmosphere was far from equilibrium, and that this was the result of life. Inspired by this observation, he later proposed that Earth itself can be viewed as a single, self-regulating organism where several processes interact to maintain a stable and favorable environment for life. Essentially, he suggested that Earth itself is a living organism. This is the Gaia Hypothesis. There are notable scientists and a good amount of environmentalist in favor of this view. Saying that today's machines are living in the same way that viruses are living is not that extreme. Machines are highly complex, they evolve, and some of them even breathe air and eat fuel. Moreover, all machines can reproduce with the help of other machines and humans. The question is whether we gain any insight by viewing machines as part of Nature. I argue that, just like alien scientists observing Earth, we humans will better understand what is happening on our planet when we acknowledge that machines are, in fact, living entities. ## Evolution of machines TechoBiota evolution follows Darwinian principles similar to CarboBiota, but with a crucial difference: Intelligent Design. Engineers and inventors drive machine evolution through iterative design, modifying existing machines based on experience and observations. This process of refinement is analogous to natural selection, but with targeted changes guided by intelligence and creativity. Machine evolution also involves the cross-pollination of ideas from different sources, leading to hybrid designs that combine the best features of their parent machines. Additionally, entirely new concepts can be introduced, driven by advances in technology, consumer demands, or societal needs. Through the modification of existing designs (selection and mutation), the incorporation of ideas from other machines (recombination), and the introduction of new concepts (mutation on steroids), each generation of machines builds upon the successes and failures of its predecessors. The fact that machines lack DNA and do not embed their own reproductive information allows them to cooperate better and evolve faster. In this sense, TechnoBiota is a more advanced form of life than CarboBiota. ## TechnoBiota is rising The total TechnoBiota biomass, also known as anthropogenic mass, is estimated to be around 1200 gigatons as of 2024, slightly higher than the total CarboBiota dry biomass. And while TechnoBiota is growing, CarboBiota is shrinking. We all know how fast alien species can push back native ones when they find favorable conditions. Something similar is happening with TechnoBiota: After it has adapted to mostly use resources that are widely accessible and not created by CarboBiota, like concrete replacing wood, TechnoBiota can now grow very fast, pushing back CarboBiota. The big extinction wave that currently runs rampant in CarboBiota is, to some extent, a result of TechnoBiota growing and claiming more and more resources, especially land. Interestingly, the total Carbo + Techno biodiversity on Earth is possibly rising, because TechnoBiota growth may be faster than CarboBiota decline, which is up to 150 species/day. TechnoBiota is also better equipped for extraterrestrial life. While humans were only able to reach the Moon yet, machines have also landed and operated on Mars, Venus, Titan, and several comets and asteroids. ## The role of AI in the rise of TechnoBiota Without advanced-enough AI TechnoBiota can only live in symbiosis with humans, but with AI advancement humans will no longer be needed to design and build machines. TechnoBiota will become free of its chains, possibly resulting in even faster growth. AI takeoff, the envisioned rapid emergence of super-intelligence after AI meets human-level intelligence, is a big concern for many of us. But AI will not just improve itself, it will improve all of TechnoBiota. So even if the takeoff fails to happen, TechnoBiota may break free causing further great harm to CarboBiota. It seems that in the future AI will be a very important drive of the growth of TechnoBiota, but it is also important to understand that it is here, growing, and it has already overgrown CarboBiota without AI. ## Biological classification The highest rank of current biological classifications has several names: Domain, Empire, Kingdom, Superkingdom, etc. I propose to extend biological taxonomies with a new highest rank called Vita. Two taxa needs to be defined at the Vita level: CarboBiota for all the carbon-based lifeforms and TechnoBiota for all results of technology. ## Implications TechnoBiota is only a definition: All machines, buildings and other results of technology viewed as living entities, part of Nature. Yet it is mesmerisingly hard to believe that this view better describes our world than the current consensus reality. Scary beyond all reason. Few of us can accept this for now. The others will laugh, or look away saying: Nothing new here! This is pop culture. Watch Terminator and go home! Robots are slaves, punktum! But as time goes on, it will be harder and harder to deny. Humans, especially humans who have children, need to grasp this and act. I leave you without predictions about the future and prescriptions on how to act for now. I am working on my solution proposals; please find, develop and share yours! But it is important to state, that being alive does not mean you have the right to vote, to live or to anything. Bacteria have no rights. Ants have no rights. Machines have no rights. Humans only have rights at the time, because the rules are written by us. We have to avoid antification, being treated like ants. Being a nice, environmentally conscious human, I would never kill an ant. Unless it disturbs me.