Could Life Use Different Molecular Building Blocks?

Get Professional High Quality Talk Therapy at BetterHelp. 10% off your first month of therapy with this link - https://betterhelp.com/giantsshoulder (Paid Partnership by BetterHelp)Terrence Deacon is a neuro-anthropologist at UC Berkeley and author of The Symbolic Species and Incomplete Nature, two landmark works exploring how life and mind emerge from the physical world.Deacon’s work connects thermodynamics, evolution, and neuroscience to tackle one of science’s biggest questions — how matter can give rise to purpose, meaning, and consciousness. From the physics of snowflakes to the biology of living cells to the mystery of human thought, he shows how energy flow and self-organization can create the building blocks of life and mind.Expect to learn why the brain is not a computer, how information becomes meaning, what it takes for life to maintain order in a universe that tends toward chaos, the difference between homeodynamic, morphodynamic, and teleodynamic processes, how the first cells may have formed, why “absence” can have causal power, why AI systems don’t yet have true “aboutness,” and how understanding these principles could reshape how we think about life, consciousness, and artificial intelligence.Timestamps00:00 Intro & The Origins of Brains02:35 How Many Times Did the Brain Evolve?07:10 Could Life Have Evolved with Different Chemistry?11:40 Before DNA: The Mystery of LUCA17:20 How One Genetic Code Took Over the Planet23:45 Proto-Life and the First Self-Making Systems30:15 Why Evolution “Falls Up”: Creativity Through Redundancy38:10 From Thermodynamics to Life: The Physics of Purpose45:50 Snowflakes Remember the Sky: How Order Emerges from Chaos52:40 Homeodynamic, Morphodynamic, and Teleodynamic Life59:20 When Chemistry Starts to Care: The Birth of Normativity01:05:30 From Matter to Mind: The First Steps of Sentience01:13:00 Why Movement Creates Mind01:20:45 Language, Symbols, and the Explosion of Human Consciousness01:28:20 Can AI Ever Be Truly Sentient?01:36:00 Why the Brain Is Not a Computer01:42:30 Meaning, Mind, and the Future of Consciousness...Neuroscience Products I Swear By (Supports the Channel)Sentia Spirits: https://sentiaspirits.com/mcgloughlin4209355084Manta Sleep Mask: Get the Comfiest Sleep Mask on the Planet (Use Code GIANTSMANTA10 https://bit.ly/4ilzfBL )[Brain.FM](http://brain.fm/): Music Entrainment for Focused Deep Work (30 Day Free Trial: https://www.brain.fm/giantsshoulder)[Consensus.AI](http://consensus.ai/): https://get.consensus.app/we00d2cmjpqeFollow My Neuroscience Podcast - The Giants ShoulderSpotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/5m3Gta5MtIYdk59pb2GJ7M?si=b33232eae67b4126Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/brief-enquiry-to-the-brain/id1752486249