Justification for treating institutions as higher order forms of life

I make the claim that institutions are higher order forms of life.  This post will some formal definitions, my logical justification, as well a defense of some common qualms people have.

So how can we distinguish whether these institutions fulfill that definition independently of us humans, who obviously do fit the definition of life?  What are the processes and compound structure and autocatalysis that constitute institutions?

First, I think we need to establish the independence from humans.  Since near their inception institutions have almost certainly had non-human participants of at least 2 kinds. (1) animals.  A trained animal fulfills a role that otherwise would be filled by humans. Whether it is moving a plow, running across a distance with a messenger, etc. (2) sub-institutions. A kingdom has subjects that are human, but they also have subjects that are other kingdoms.  In the last century or two, we are seeing the propagation of a third kind of non-human participant in institutions: automatons.

A natural question that arises is: what distinguishes an animal which is a part of an institution versus a wild animal, a pet, or one that’s just helping out in a casual way?

The distinction is in the acknowledgement of the animal in the “code” of the institution.  If an individual person uses a dog to help them deliver mail, from the perspective of the post office as an institution, it’s just a person who is a little extra productive. There’s no record of the dog.  Without that record, the dog is imperceptible to the institution.

However there are institutions which do define explicit roles which animals can fill. A K-9 unit has written policies specifically for dogs. They have individual dogs who are given food (ie energy is distributed to them) in exchange for their achievement of certain goals.

So then we come to automatons, which computer programs fall into and are probably the most numerous. We have automations which select fruit, which create shipping labels, pack boxes etc.  It’s not inconceivable to have a fully automated factory. And a vending machine is a fully automated POS (point of sale) system. We can conceive of a company which automatically fulfills each piece of these roles which originally were fulfilled with humans.  AI is not strictly necessary for this. Just programs which automatically identify ideal locations for vending machines, a delivery mechanism for the vending machines (perhaps have them drive themselves), robots to refill the machines, automatic purchases to provision necessary materials and supplies. This could all be done with no management. With our current technology it would likely not adapt quickly enough to stay in business long enough to make a profit from the initial investment… but there will soon be a day where it will.  In such a case an employee handbook will be unnecessary, but the roles and expectations of each member will be explicitly defined in code.

So we can see, humans are not strictly necessary to perform these corporate processes.  Similarly each role within the government could slowly be replaced with automatons.  Every institution can similarly have its members replaced without it even knowing, as long as those agents are providing the appropriate information to the institution (and other agents of the institution).

We must conclude that humans are not strictly necessary for institutions, so they must be something beyond the actions we perform on their behalf.  They at least have the potential to exist independently of us.

So they’re independent, but what does it mean to be a form of life?

Wikipedia says this about life: “It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, organisation, metabolism, growth, adaptation, response to stimuli, and reproduction. ”

I think it can be agreed that institutions hold the capacity for each of these properties.  Organization, growth, adaptation, and response to stimuli probably don’t need further elaboration.  That leaves homeostasis, metabolism, and reproduction.

Let’s start with homeostasis.  Homeostasis is defined by Wikipedia as “the state of steady internal physical and chemical conditions maintained by living systems.”  We can ignore the circularity of that definition and focus on the state physical and chemical conditions.  One aspect is temperature.  We can see large buildings built by institutions with HVAC whose climate control is maintained through intentional company policies and transactions.  Convenience stores maintain a certain inventory.  Companies target a certain supply of materials required for manufacture or supplied parts.  Governments make policies which ensure adequate resources are available to citizens such as food, fuel, water, power, etc.

Wikipedia calls metabolism: the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cellular processes; the conversion of food to building blocks of proteins, lipids, nucleic acids, and some carbohydrates; and the elimination of metabolic wastes.  The equivalent 3 main functions for institutions might be: the conversion of fuel into electricity; The conversion of natural resources into building materials like plastics or concrete; or sewage and sanitation systems.  A more subtle analogy may be more suitable as well, for instance the conversion of a product or service into money; the conversion of money into materials like concrete, plastics, steel, etc. or basic standardized products and supplies; as well as sewage & sanitation systems.  However it’s clear that institutions bring in potential energy in some form and convert it into building blocks which they then build into more complex structures.  They also use some energy to reduce entropy internally, by removing waste, performing quality assurance etc.

And reproduction is (according to Wikipedia as well) :  the biological process by which new individual organisms – “offspring” – are produced from their “parent” or parents.  This one seems pretty clear, but there are ample instances of institutions propagating themselves in various forms, from colonies, to the proliferation of Abrahamic religions, to franchises.  Not all organizations do this deliberately in their policy  In other words, they don’t have explicit code for creating copies of themselves.  But many do.

A more modern approach to a definition of life would be thermodynamic. I’m not sure that an exact definition has been specified and accepted. However one that could be acceptable to many who view it in terms of dissipative systems might be something like: a physical process which produces a compound structure which autocatalyzes and produces units which can persist in combination for periods much greater than the time of its constituents do individually.

Breaking this down, let’s start with “a physical process …”.  We know that eventually the vast majority of atoms and cells in our body get replaced.  So where exactly are we physically?  It’s similar to a whirlpool.  All the water molecules are getting replaced quickly.  No particular molecules are moving in a circle… they’re bouncing around.  And yet we can see that whirlpools exist and can sink ships.  Hence life and whirlpools are processes

“…which produces a compound structure…” — The structure is compound in the sense that it has internal organization.  Essentially this means specialization.   Each institution has some division of roles.  This is required in order for processes to be applied differently to different entities within the organization.  In essence without that there is only one process state possible and thus a change of state is impossible.

“…which autocatalyzes and produces units…”—An institution autocatalyzes in the sense that it produces more of what is necessary for itself to exist, and produces copies and variations of itself.  As previously mentioned in discussing reproduction, reproduction is not always spelled out in the code of the organization, however it often is.

“units which can persist in combination for periods much greater than the time of its constituents do individually”.  We can see that institutions persist for periods much greater than their constituents.. humans.  A cathedral can take generations to get built.  Even regarding smaller institutions, there are businesses that have existed for centuries.  Similarly, a cell outlives its proteins, and an organism outlives its cells.

Hopefully this is enough to convince someone that institutions fulfill existing definitions of life.  So that should establish institutions as a life form independent of human beings, and yet which has sprung from us.  So what does this mean?

We can further analyze this idea by analogizing between genetically-driven biochemical life, and this higher order life form.  Are business processes equivalent to DNA? etc.  We can also analyze institutions further thermodynamically as dissipative systems just as we do with biochemical life.

This is a valuable perspective for many reasons.  We should be able to apply laws of thermodynamics to make predictions about organizations.  Exploring institutions in this way can also help us explore biochemical life, as well as possibly give insights into physics and information theory, etc.

We can use this idea to assess the relationship we have with these institutions, and how they influence our behavior, including how they might be contributing to political division, destruction of our habitat etc.  Since we are their hosts, at least for now, if they extract too much from us, they suffer.  Clearly there is symbiosis, but there seems to be an increasing imbalance within this relationship.

We can use this idea to design better institutions which more effectively serve the needs of their members.  And we can instill in these institutions the ability to self-limit what they extract from us, in order to take advantage of the strengths of institutional behavior while also leaving room for us to be the humans we are.

We can be engineering our institutions to provide more transparency, more of a voice for the average person… instead of fighting an uphill battle against regulatory capture we can design institutions which self-regulate.

This is not just an academic curiosity.  If my understanding is correct, the internal energies of societies have far outpaced the speed at which they can integrate decision-making information from their citizens.  Essentially the boat has grown to the size of a ship but the rudder has stayed the same size.  We can massively scale the speed at which we integrate people’s input into the decision-making process. We have the technology.  And if we want to get our democracies functioning again, if we want to adapt to a world with AI.. if we want to stop destroying the earth, it’s critical to use it.