Matter is organizable because it possesses degrees of freedom, constraints, and dissipation pathways. Life emerges when flows, under constraints, feed regulation loops capable of sustaining self-maintained organization.
Time in the living
In relativity, proper time is locally invariant. In the living, there is no invariant experienced time: duration depends on the system's capacity to convert flows into organization. When margins shrink, this conversion degrades, and subjective time distorts.
Why the living can hold far from equilibrium
A living system can remain far from equilibrium because it is not isolated. It is immersed in a whole, connected to flows, fed by exchanges. It holds because it is carried, fed, contained, corrected by its environment.
Mechanisms
It lives on flows — The living maintains itself through inputs and outputs: energy, information, relations, resources. If flows stop, organization disintegrates.
The whole dampens its excesses — The system benefits from relative external stability. It can remain dysregulated inside while appearing stable outside.
Connections serve as crutches — In a couple, family, or institution, someone or something often compensates. As long as these crutches hold, the system holds.
Distance from equilibrium can be organization — Some living systems organize precisely far from equilibrium by exploiting gradients.
Where it tips
The risk is depending on the whole to compensate for internal disorganization that keeps growing. When support drops, flows dry up, or complexity increases, disintegration can become rapid.