The first reports that life flourished in the deepest parts of the ocean stunned biologists. Because the energy that gives life to virtually all previously known organisms can be traced back to sunlight, no one knew it could be derived from something else.
Life is the process of using energy to convert raw materials into information.
The division of labor in a bumblebee colony might appear to be the result of organized cooperation, but it is not. The logic of the economic environment dictates competition by scramblingfor food rather than competition by territorial aggression. The survival of every bee species rests upon an intricate relationship between an anatomy that minimizes energy costs and a behavior pattern that maximizes energy revenues. Despite their great beauty and delicacy, all of nature's elaborate contrivances of bumblebee anatomy and behavior come down to nothing more than a way of turning profits into information.