THE BOTTOM LINE: The ultimate origin of goal-oriented behavior lies in the laws of physics, which involve optimization. Thermodynamics has the built-in goal of dissipation: to increase a measure of messiness that’s called entropy. Life is a phenomenon that can help dissipate (increase overall messiness) even faster by retaining or growing its complexity and replicating while increasing the messiness of its environment. Darwinian evolution shifts the goal-oriented behavior from dissipation to replication. Intelligence is the ability to accomplish
