Life

REF: TNG-0609

BEGIN SCENE

Commander: What is the definition of life?

Doctor: That is a big question. Why do you ask?

Commander: I am searching for a definition that will allow me to test a hypothesis.

Doctor: Well the broadest scientific defintion might be that life is what enables plants and animals to consume food, derive energy from it, grow, adapt themselves to their surroundings and reproduce.

Commander: And you suggest that anything that exhibits these characteristics is alive?

Doctor: In general, yes.

Commander: What about fire?

Doctor: Fire?

Commander: Yes, it consumes fuel to produce energy, it grows, it creates offspring. By your definition is it alive?

Doctor: Fire is a chemical reaction, you could use the same argument for growing crystals, but obviously we don't consider them alive.

Commander: But what about me? I do not grow, I do not reproduce, yet I am considered to be alive.

[Context: LT. Commander Data is an Android - A machine or automaton in the form of a human being. (From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide])]

Doctor: But you are unique.

Commander: Hmm… I wonder if that is so.

Doctor: Data, if I may ask, have a seat, what exactly are you getting at?

Commander: I am curious as to what transpired between the moment when I was nothing more than an assemblage of parts in Dr. Sung's laboratory and the next moment when I became alive, what is it that endowed me with life?

[Context: Dr. Sung is the creator of Lt. Commander Data.]

Doctor: I remember Wesley asking me a similar question when he was little and I tried desperately to give him an answer, but everything I said sounded inadequate, but then I realized scientists and philosophers have been grappling with that question for centuries without coming to any conclusion.

[Context: Wesley is the son of Dr. Crusher.]

Commander: Are you saying the question cannot be answered?

Doctor: No, I think i'm saying that we struggle all our lives to answer it but it's the struggle that is important, that's what helps us to define our place in the universe.

Commander: Nods in acknowledgment I believe I understand doctor.

Doctor: I don't think i've been very much help to you.

Commander: On the contrary, you have been a great deal of help, thank you.

END SCENE