<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Dear Guy and FIS colleagues,</font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Thank you for your comments and the copy of your article. Your views on the roots of biological systems and their evolution in dissipate systems are very interesting. Your paper reminds me of a paper by Virgo and Froese on how simple dissipative structures can demonstrate many of the characteristics associated with living systems, and the work of Jeremy England at MIT.</span></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Given your research focus and expertise in looking at living systems as dissipative systems, I would appreciate your views and assistance in understanding </span></font><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">the energetics involved in the common multilevel organisational pattern (CMOP) (presented in the paper II of the kick-off mail).</span></font></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class="">At first glance, i<font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">t appears that different levels in self-organization in living systems a core dynamic in living systems is comprised of a cycle between a class of more-stable species (coupled-composite species) and a class of less-stable species (decoupled-composite species), see paper II in the kick-off mail.</span></font></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">hence:</span></font></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Level 1: Molecular self-organization, involves a cycle between oxidised molecules (more stable) and reduced molecules (less stable) in molecular self-organization in photosynthesis and cellular metabolism [Morowitz and smith]. </span></font></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></span></font></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Level 2: Cellular self-orgnaization, involves a cycle between autotrophic species (more stable) and heterotrophic species (less stable) in ecosystems [Stability of species types as defined by- </span></font><span style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">Yodzis and Innes </span><span style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">Yodzis, P.; Innes, S. Body Size and Consumer-Resource Dynamics. </span><i style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">Am. Nat.</i><span style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class=""> 1992, </span><i style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">139</i><span style="font-size: 14px; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">, 1151].</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;" class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Level 3: Social self-self-organization, involves a cycle between kinship-based social groups (more stable) and non-kinship-based social groups (less stable) [Stability of species types as suggested in Paper II, based on an extension of work of Robin Dunbar and others]. </span></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">At level 1 (molecular self-organiztion)- solar energy is stored in the high-energy reduced molecules. </span></font><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class="">Do you see a possibility that living systems could store energy in cycles involving less stable species at the two other levels (level 2, and 3) as well? </span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class="">(When I speak of stored energy, I am referring to stored-energy as introduced by Mclare, and discussed by Ulanowicz and Ho [Sustainable Systems as Organi</span><span style="font-size: 14px;" class=""><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">sms?, </span><span style="font-family: Times;" class="">BioSystems 82 (2005) 39–51]</span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class="">. </span></div><div class=""><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></span></div><div class=""><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14px;" class="">These are early thoughts and your views are much appreciated. </span></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Many Thanks,</span></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Warm regards,</span></font></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" class=""><span style="font-size: 14px;" class="">Nikhil Joshi</span></font></div><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class=""><br class=""></font></div><div class=""></div><br class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class=""></font></div><br class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii" class=""><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8" class=""><div class=""><font face="Times New Roman" style="font-size: 14px;" class=""></font></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On 01-Dec-2015, at 10:27 pm, Guy A Hoelzer <<a href="mailto:hoelzer@unr.edu" class="">hoelzer@unr.edu</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class="">
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<div class="">Hi All,</div>
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<div class="">I have been following this thread with interest as much as time permits. I think multilevel approaches to understanding information flow is an important one. I also think the structure of natural systems exhibits both hierarchical and heterarchical
features. The hierarchies we formally recognize can be extremely useful, but they are rarely exclusive of alternatives. Here is a link to a paper Mark Tessera and I published a couple of years ago arguing for one particular hierarchy of multilevel emergence
in physical systems connecting lower level physical systems to biological systems:</div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class=""><br class="">
</span></div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class="">Tessara, M., and G. A. Hoelzer. 2013.
</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class="">On the thermodynamics of multilevel evolution. Biosystems 113: 140–143.</span></div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class=""><br class="">
</span></div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class="">Regards,</span></div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class=""><br class="">
</span></div>
<div class=""><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;" class="">Guy</span></div>
<br class="">
<div apple-content-edited="true" class="">Guy Hoelzer, Associate Professor<br class="">
Department of Biology<br class="">
University of Nevada Reno<br class="">
<br class="">
Phone: 775-784-4860<br class="">
Fax: 775-784-1302<br class="">
<a href="mailto:hoelzer@unr.edu" class="">hoelzer@unr.edu</a> </div>
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