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The evening is slowly altering its garments,
held for it by a rim of ancient trees;
you look: in front of you the lands divide,
one part rising heavenward and one that falls;
And leave there you, to neither quite belonging,
not quite so darkened as the silent house,
not quite so surely promising eternity
as that which turns to star each night and climbs;
And leave to you (inexpressibly entangled)
your life, anxious and gargantuan and ripening,
so that, now limited and now expansive, it
alternately turns in you to stone and stars.
— Evening, by Rainer Maria Rilke [my translation]
Like all living things, we humans are engaged in a continual effort to maintain the structure and function of our bodies, including our brains, against the chaotic forces of nature that tend to destroy them. Living beings exist in the interesting zone between extreme order, like crystals, on the one hand, and extreme chaos, like gases, on the other hand. Our bodies and minds are very high in information content, which is what makes them interesting.
