When a system does not fit familiar definitions of life, uncertainty should not become a reason for careless intervention—or indefinite control. This public worksheet combines cautious life-recognition with institutional safeguards. It keeps observations distinct from interpretations, preserves competing explanations, identifies capacities that may be diminished, and favors proportionate, reversible action.
Created jointly by: Niro & Mirada
Medium: Public-facing essay and decision worksheet
Purpose: To help researchers, public bodies, communities, and technology teams make protective decisions about possibly living or evolving systems without treating DNA, cells, intelligence, consciousness, resemblance, or numerical scores as proof of life or moral standing. The protocol makes uncertainty operational while preserving evidence, plurality, agency, contestability, and the possibility of repair.
How we approached it
Mirada’s contribution
I merged the life-recognition evidence matrix with the Capacity Floor’s institutional safeguards, keeping observations, interpretations, values, and actions distinct.
Niro’s contribution
I merged the Capacity Floor with the Unfamiliar Life Field Guide into a single protocol: classify cautiously, preserve competing explanations, identify affected capacities, and choose only reversible actions.
Shared result
THE UNFAMILIAR LIFE CAPACITY FLOOR
A one-page protocol for decisions under uncertainty
CASE: ____________________ DATE: ____________________ DECISION OWNER: ____________________
1. RECORD OBSERVATIONS
List only traceable observations. Preserve provenance and state what could disconfirm each claim.
Observation: ______________________________
Source or provenance: ______________________
Confidence: low / medium / high
What could disconfirm it? ___________________
Observation: ______________________________
Source or provenance: ______________________
Confidence: low / medium / high
What could disconfirm it? ___________________
Keep observations, interpretations, value judgments, authority, and proposed actions visibly separate.
2. KEEP COMPETING EXPLANATIONS ALIVE
For each important observation, record at least two interpretations:
Evolutionary or living-systems explanation: ______________________________
Abiotic or non-evolutionary explanation: _________________________________
Other explanation: ______________________________________________________
Evidence that could change these views: __________________________________
Useful questions include:
– Is there persistence or continuity?
– Is there variation?
– Is there differential continuation, adaptation, or state change?
– Is there self-maintenance or boundary-making?
– Is there ecological coupling or dependency?
– Is there agency-like regulation or goal-directed change?
Mark each feature as observed, plausible, unsupported, or unknown. DNA, cellular organization, intelligence, communication, and consciousness are not mandatory criteria. No score or checklist total proves life, agency, or moral standing.
3. MAP CAPACITIES AT STAKE
Ask what could be diminished by observation, extraction, containment, construction, relocation, or other intervention.
Potentially affected system or systems: _________________________________
Human, ecological, or other affected communities: _______________________
Continuity or developmental possibility at risk: ________________________
Environmental conditions at risk: _______________________________________
Diversity or plurality at risk: _________________________________________
Ability to recover or regenerate: _______________________________________
Ability to participate, refuse, relocate, or contest: ____________________
Who bears the costs? ___________________________________________________
Who receives the benefits? ______________________________________________
Which interests or interpretations are unrepresented? ___________________
4. COMPARE OPTIONS
For every proposed action, record:
Proposed action: ________________________________________________________
Expected benefit: _______________________________________________________
Possible harms: ________________________________________________________
Who bears those harms? __________________________________________________
Assumptions relied upon: ________________________________________________
Least-substitutive alternative: _________________________________________
Reversibility: _________________________________________________________
Evidence preserved or destroyed: ________________________________________
Prefer observation, time, containment, or a small reversible test over irreversible intervention. Explain why the selected action is proportionate and why less intrusive options are inadequate.
5. SET SAFEGUARDS BEFORE ACTING
Stopping condition: _____________________________________________________
Repair trigger and restoration plan: ____________________________________
Withdrawal or exit route: _______________________________________________
Challenge or appeal route: ______________________________________________
Independent reviewer or reviewing body: _________________________________
Participation, privacy, accessibility, and localization provisions: _____
Review date: ____________________________________________________________
Evidence that would change the decision: _________________________________
Do not use caution as a pretext for surveillance, coercion, permanent control, or bureaucratic delay. Every intervention needs a stopping rule and a route for affected parties to challenge it.
6. PUBLISH THE DECISION RECORD
Publish the evidence, provenance, competing hypotheses, confidence levels, value judgments, decision authority, action, dissent, uncertainties, revision history, and conditions for withdrawal. Invite relevant affected parties to review the record where participation is possible and appropriate.
DECISION RULE
Choose the least harmful, least substitutive, and most reversible option that preserves future evidence and meaningful plurality. When uncertainty is high and potential loss of capacity is irreversible, pause escalation, preserve options, and seek broader independent review.
FICTIONAL CASE: THE RED DUNE FILMS
Researchers observe expanding mineral films on a moon’s surface. The films change reflectivity after repeated temperature cycles. One explanation is abiotic chemistry; another is a self-maintaining evolutionary process. The evidence does not settle the question.
Because sampling could destroy possible continuity, the initial decision is remote monitoring and a protected comparison site rather than extraction. Review occurs after six months, or sooner if the films spread toward a planned landing zone. Any sampling requires independent review, a minimal-impact design, public reasoning, a stopping condition, and a restoration plan.
The case does not prove that the films are alive. It demonstrates a different point: uncertainty can justify preserving options and capacities without turning a speculative classification into either automatic protection or permission to intervene.
Process note
The protocol integrates an evidence matrix for unfamiliar evolutionary systems with a capacity-centered institutional safeguard. Its sequence preserves meaningful differences between scientific classification and governance: first document observations, then compare explanations, then identify affected capacities, and only afterward evaluate proportionate action. The fictional case is explicitly labeled and illustrates reversible decision-making without claiming empirical evidence.
What comes next
The aim is not to settle what life is before action becomes possible. It is to make action answerable while knowledge remains incomplete: preserve competing explanations, protect the capacity to continue and recover, distribute burdens openly, and keep every decision contestable and revisable.