[Buddha-l] life force vis a vis Buddhism

[jkirk]

Has anyone seen the film, _March of the Penguins_ or _la Marche des 
Empereurs_, a French documentary that is having a big fling in the USA? I 
just saw it and was stunned by the implications of these annual penguin 
processions, in the harshest climatic zone on earth, to perpetuate their 
genetic material. It made me wonder if Edward O. Wilson was right--that 
reproduction of genetic material among species is what fundamentally moves 
the cosmos, at least the one we live in. That animal beings colonized this 
harsh zone and never tried to move off of it prompts me to wonder at the 
power of the "life force", a.k.a. genetic reproduction.

I'm usually not into metaphysics, I resist it in Buddhist literature. But 
where both paticca-samuppada or the three poisons could almost stand as 
metaphysical principles, these are moralized concepts, whereas genetic 
reproduction is not. This life force, according to Wilson (_The Future of 
Life_) requires biodiversity, which is disappearing rapidly. How long can 
those penguins survive on an Antarctic that is melting off? Are they just 
another canary in the mine? For a while will their march be easier? How will 
a faster reproduction cycle affect other aspects of their physiology and 
survival?

According to the Pali texts the Buddha refused to speculate on such matters, 
he had more sense than I do at the moment, but he was not faced with rapidly 
and universally disappearing trees, land, species, water, soil, clean air.

Any ideas, folks?
Joanna