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A third class of actors are all of the various forms of life on earth. From the geological record's point of view, life has had a major impact on earth. Between ice ages, when the water which was stacked on the North and South Poles melted and the oceans are teaming with life, extensive deposits of fossils and organic material occur. These organically rich layers of rock are called Highstand Systems Tracks, and occur at regular astronomical Molankovich Cycles3.6 As sedimentary layers are built up from erosion of the continents, these organic rich Highstand Systems Tracks become lubricated guide planes, which create the giant growth faults found in the Gulf of Mexico, offshore Nigeria and Indonesia and Brazil, and in other places around the world. The movement of these massive amounts of earth are thus ultimately controlled by life. The creation of coal and peat through the decay of life in the swamps, forest and grass control of erosion, as well changing the atmosphere's gas mixture through photosynthesis and respiration, each provide examples of how life impacts the stage called planet earth. This third class of actors includes phytoplankton, bacteria, moss and algae, grasses, flowers and bushes, trees, insects, and all the different kinds of fishes birds and amphibians and reptiles and animals living and dieing on planet Earth's stage.
Life needs a context and a physical place within which to exist. Modern science understands context much better now than ever in the past. For instance, think of the impact of gravity and the fact the sun provides more of a framework for earth than simply a source of sunlight and heat. The sun's gravitational field provides the space and a time framework within which the earth, and all which exists in and on and around the earth can exist. Think of all that we know about physical context: electricity, magnetism, radiation, temperature, pressure, changing from solids to liquids to gaseous states, etc. Think about all we know about biological context: the double helix, DNA, RNA, proteins, amino acids, cells, organs, transplants, medicines, cloning, etc. Each of these processes works within certain laws or boundaries, or in a certain context. These laws, or this context, provides a fourth class of actor.
The physical place within which life exists might be an ocean, a sea, a river, a stream, a sand bar, a beach, a marsh, a savanna, a forest, a city, metropolis, or even a space station. This physical place is really the set for the other actors. Remember the set dynamically changes as a function of changes in the geology or in the ocean or in the river or in the atmosphere or in the city. The physical place becomes the fifth class of actor.
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paradoxes