Protective Layers - How The World Builds The New

[pagetheoracle]

I see in the world that life is full of 'creative crusts' or protective containers.  The planet has an atmosphere or life couldn't exist and we see it in eggs, seeds, pupa*, mollusc shells, cysts, crustaceans, arachnids, insects, cells with their semi-permeable membranes (countries and their borders), skin, skulls, wombs, factories & assembly lines, cars, planes, ships, submarines, houses, (caves & mud huts in the past, where tool making could be carried out in peace), fridges and freezers, showers and baths, walled gardens, plant pots, tins, bottles, jars and other preservative containers, cardboard cartons, cupboards, drawers, shoes, socks, hats, clothing in general as a protective layer.

 

I see these patterns as necessary for all life to have a stable base, free of outside disturbance, in which to develop - whether it is nature or human imitation, building bodies or artifacts.  Is this a new idea or one already noted?

 

*  If you view society as a chrysalis, then re-organization of it can be seen in the same way, politically, socially etc.

 

[HydrogenBond]

The way I look at it, is like this. The protective and contained layers are based on the principle of phases and phase boundaries. An example is ice floating in water, surrounded by air. We have three phases in contact (gas, liquid and solid), with each phase distinct, yet all working as a team to achieve an integrated effect.

 

The skull is mostly bone which is a different phase from the brain matter below and the skin above. While the brain, itself, has several phases; gel (brain matter) and liquids (blood and cerebral spinal fluid).

 

When we take materials, such as water, and induce it to change phases (solid, liquid or vapor), we need to create certain conditions, such as specific combinations of pressure and temperature. This suggest that each phase, from container to contents, exists under specific conditions, which allow it to phase out. Each layer retains its conditions with the interacting phases defining gradients.

 

The ice floating in water surrounded by air, has the ice stuck at 0C, the liquid is warmer than that, while the air has lower internal pressure. These create an energy gradient that integrates them.  

 

In social organizations, some social conditions include wealth and power, while other social conditions include poverty, with each set of conditions causing its own phase of people to appear.  These two phases are all part of the whole, with the phase capacitance of each, causing an exchange of energy between in terms of social programs and consumerism. 

 

One can't just place a poor person, in a rich environment, expect them to be immediately be rich or powerful. It will be like placing an ice cube in water and expecting it to instantly dissolve. It takes time for the phase capacitance to be used up, as the person adapt and slowly changes their ways and outlook, and begins to take on the properties of the new liquid phase; melting. Often social change takes time, so previous social phases have time to change, and new social phase can appear due to the altered conditions. 

 

 

 

 

[pagetheoracle]

Very elegant way of looking at it