by Simon Wright

Created on: February 07, 2008

Life is a quite wondrous thing. Thus far, it has only been observed on one planet, where it can be found in a mind-boggling array of forms. It can be as complex as a human being or as simple as a single cell amoeba. It can exist in quite amazing extremes, from the depths of an ocean, to the hottest of deserts and the coldness of the Antarctic.

The title of this article is The secret of life' and this can be interpreted in two ways. We can either see it as being about the origins of life; how did life come about? Or it can be viewed as simply being about what we, as individuals, need to do in order to make the most of our life.

Let's start with the harder question what is the secret of life from a biological perspective? There are two views on how life came into being. The established scientific view is that life evolved over many millions of years, starting off with very simple basic units of life that existed in Earth's early primordial soup, that gradually became increasingly complex until creatures such as reptiles, mammals, birds, etc, emerged. Under this Darwinian model, one of the great things is the understanding that we are related (however distantly) to so many of our fellow living things.

The alternative view is that God spirited all life into existence. Most mainstream churches have reconciled the existence of evolution by saying that life may have evolved but it was God who was behind it in the first place. There remain, however, some religious groups who continue to take the Bible literally and claim that God created humans fully formed, with a solitary man (Adam) and a solitary woman (Eve) propagating our entire species.

So there you have it. The secret of life, in the grandest, of senses is that is it either evolved naturally with the only external force being the energy provided by ultraviolet light. Or it evolved following an initial intervention from a god. Or it was created fully formed by a god and evolution hasn't happened. You can take your pick as to which is the truth.

That leads us onto the second interpretation of this article's title. What is the secret of life at a micro level? What do we need to learn in order to make the most of our own life? There are many answers that could be given to this question. However, my personal take on it is that we need to be comfortable with ourselves. Too many people worry about how others perceive them, or about their personal appearance. It is only by becoming comfortable with who you are, and your place in the universe, that you can truly become happy.

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