What Is Life? The Quantum Theory of Life

What is life — really? Not just biologically, but at the deepest quantum level?

In this episode, quantum physicist and Tao Science co-founder Dr. Rulin Xiu presents a revolutionary answer from a 2025 peer-reviewed paper she co-authored with Dr. and Master Zhi Gang Sha. She proposes that life is any system capable of systematically maintaining, developing, enhancing, and transmitting positive information — a quantum definition that transforms how we understand sickness, healing, the purpose of existence, and the search for life beyond Earth.

You will discover why the traditional biological definition of life is incomplete, what positive and negative information mean in quantum physics, and why quantum science concludes that the purpose of life is to elevate the soul.

Referenced Paper: Zhigang Sha, Rulin Xiu. A Proposal of Quantum Theory of Life Based on Tao Science. Reports in Advances of Physical Sciences, Vol. 09, 2550012 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1142/S2424942425500124

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Have you ever wondered the philosophy of the stars? Also covering the stars. Quantum physicist and co-founder of the Al Science. As he bridges the frontiers of modern science with the deepest wisdom of the universe. Welcome to the Unified Science of Everything. Together, we will unlock the code of creation.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

Welcome to Unified Science of Everything. Unlocking the Codes of Creation and Manifestation. I'm your host, Dr. Zhu Lang Shu, a quantum physicist and co-founder of Tao Science with Dr. And with Dr. and Master Chi Gang Sha. Today I want to explore with you an important, fundamental, intimate, and personal question. What is life? What is this thing you are living right now? What is this force that animates your body that makes you breathe and makes you feel love, pain, wonder, and joy? What is the difference between you and a living, breathing, experiencing being? The chair you are sitting on. You might think this is a question biology has already answered. And in a way, biology has given us a list of answers. A living thing has cells, it metabolizes, it reproduces, it responds to stimuli, it adapts and evolves. These are the textbook definitions of life. And they're not wrong, but I want to stress to you today that they are profoundly incomplete. They describe what life does, but they do not touch on what life is. So in 2025, Master Shah and I published a peer-reviewed paper and reports in advances of physical sciences. The title is A Proposal of Quantum Theory of Life Based on Tao Science. In this paper, we propose a new definition of life, not based on biology, not based on chemistry, but based on quantum physics and DAO science. We propose that life is a quantum phenomena, and this definition, as you will find out in this episode, can help us understand the meaning and purpose of life at the quantum level. And it can show us how we can enhance our health, our relationships, and every aspect of our life at the root cost. So today I'm going to walk you through this paper step by step. We will reveal the foundations of quantum physics that makes this definition possible. And we will look at what positive information and negative information are and why they are the key to understanding life. And we will see what the quantum theory of life predicts about sickness, healing, and the purpose of life. And we will explore what this means for the search for life beyond our planet and for the future of humanity itself. So let's begin. For thousands of years, philosophers and scientists have wrestled with the question of life, what life is. The ancient Greeks believed in a vital force, a special substance or energy that animated living things. This idea called vitalism persisted well into the nineteenth century, then modern biology arrived and vitalism was largely abandoned. Life, scientists concluded, is just chemistry, very complex chemistry, but chemistry nevertheless. So the current scientific definition of life focuses on a list of characteristics cellular organization, metabolism, humor, homeostasis, growth and development, reproduction, response to stimuli, adaptation, heredity, and evolution. NASA, for the purpose of searching for life, other planets defines life as a self-sustained chemical system capable of undergoing Darwinian evolution. So these definitions are useful. They give biologists a working framework. But they have a profound problem. They describe the symptoms of life, not its essence. They tell us what living things do, not what they fundamentally are. And there is a deeper problem. These definitions are entirely rooted in classical physics, in the physics of objects, forces, and trajectories. But we have known for over a century that classical physics is not the fundamental description of our reality. Quantum physics is, and quantum physics reveals a universe that is radically different from the classical picture, a universe that is probabilistic, subjective, non-local, and deeply connected. So if we want to understand the essence of life, we must use the right tool. And the right tool, we argue, is the quantum physics. So in our previous episodes, I have introduced the new interpretation of quantum physics in Tao Science based on the ancient Chinese wisdom of Jing Qixun. So in this interpretation, quantum physics reveals that at the deepest level, everything in existence is a quantum vibrational field. And this field contains three things, three components, information, energy, and matter. And matter is what we observe and experience. This physical world, the objects, the particles, the waves, and our body, everything, our relationships, finances. And what is energy? Energy is what moves and transforms the matter. It is a gasoline that contains the energy that powers the car, the heat that turns the water into the steam, and the force that drives the change. So information, the third component, is what gives the form and shape to energy and matter. Information is now visible, but information determines the qualities and quantities of everything. And it is the most fundamental component of existence. So now what does this matter for understanding life? Because if information is the essence of everything, then understanding the quality of information is the key to understand the quality of life. So in our work in the quantum theory of consciousness and quantum theory of soul, Master Shah and I pointed out there exists two types of information. So positive information and negative information. So positive information represents the connection, the order, and harmony exist in a system or between a system and its environment. So in physics, we see positive information in phenomena like quantum coherence, where the particles acting in a coordinated, synchronized way. And we see it in quantum entanglement, where two particles are so deeply connected, and what happens to one instantly affects the other, no matter how far apart they are. And we see it in natury, the inverse of entropy, a measure of order and organization. And we also see it in conditional entropy. It is a measure of how much information on one part of a system carries about another. So positive information is what brings life, health, greater spiritual ability to manifest and influence, and more success. So in our previous episode, we have revealed that soul is the content of information in our field. So positive information within us represents the quality of our soul. More positive information represents a higher level of soul with greater spiritual abilities to serve and to influence and to manifest. Negative information, on the other hand, represents disconnection, disorder, and disharmony. The classical measure of negative information is the entropy, the tendency of a system to move towards disorder. So when things fall apart, when disconnections break, when harmony dissolves, negative information increases. Negative information brings about failure, sickness, disasters, problems, and challenges. It allures our soul abilities and quality. So here is the profound insight. Irvin Schrindiger, one of the founding father of quantum physics, gave a series of seminars, which later was compiled into a famous book called What is Life? In this book, he proposed that living organisms are distinguished by their ability to resist entropy. They maintain order in the universe that tends towards disorder. They feed on negative entropy and on the order from their environment. Schrindiger was pointing at something very deep. He was saying literally that life is fundamentally about maintaining and increasing positive information. So our quantum theory of life takes this insight and gives it a precise mathematical form. So here is our proposal. In our paper, we define life as follows a living system is a system that is capable of systematically maintaining, developing, enhancing, and transmitting positive information. So let me say this again because it is worth sitting with. Life is the capacity to systematically maintain, develop, enhance, and transmit positive information. So this is the quantum definition of life. Positive information as we define it is a quantum quantity. It can be measured, it can be calculated, it can be tracked over time. So this means that for the first time, we have a definition of life that is not just qualitative, not just a list of characteristics, but quantitative. So what does this definition include? It includes all the organism, organisms that biology already recognizes as alive bacteria, plants, animals, human beings, ecosystems, there's all systems that actively maintain and enhance their internal order and their connections with their environment. But this definition also opens the door to forms of life that biology has not recognized social systems, a business, all organizations, a country, Mother Earth, the Sun, a galaxy, the universe, a community that maintains deep bounds of love and mutual support, is enhancing positive information. A civilization that cultivates wisdom and harmony is a living system in the deepest sense. And at the cosmic level, cosmic scale, the universe itself, which has been evolving toward ever greater complexity and interconnection for fourteen billion years, is itself a living system. So this definition also tells us what death is. Death is a sensation of systematic maintenance or increase of positive information. When a biological organism dies, the system begins to lose its organization, order, and connection. The positive information dissipates. The entropy increases. This understanding also shows us that the death of physical body is not necessarily the end of a life. For some individual, physical death brings a significant decrease in the positive information connected to them. The body decays, their life structure falls apart. But for others, the death of the physical body does not result in the loss of physical positive information. Their quantum field can continue to grow, evolve, and organize itself. For this individual's life not only continues beyond physical death, it can be enhanced and elevated. Conversely, some people may be physically alive, yet experiencing a kind of deeper fundamental life death, when their action generates more negative information than positive. The overall mentality of their life diminishes even while the body remains functioning. For example, Lao Tz the author of the Tao De Jing, written over 2,500 years ago, was has no recorded life deaths. Some people think he became a immortal. So even if Lao Tzu did experience physical deaths, his teachings, his book, and his spirit continue to inspire, guide, and serve countless people and his life force, his positive information, has continued to grow and has never ceased. So now let's go even deeper. If life is a capacity to maintain and enhance positive information, then the natural deduction is the purpose of life is to increase positive information. It is to create more connection, more order, more harmony within ourselves, in our relationships, in our communities, and in the world. When we love, we are generating positive information. When we serve others, we are creating connection and harmony. When we create beauty in art, in music, in science, in the way we treat each other, we are increasing positive information. When we forgive, we are dissolving the negative information of resentment and disconnection, and replacing it with positive information of healing and wholeness. Since the soul is a content of information in our field, increasing positive information is expanding and elevating our soul. Therefore, we arrived at a scientific conclusion. The purpose of life is to elevate the soul. So this is not just a spiritual teaching, this is a scientific prediction of the quantum theory of life. The purpose of life, as revealed by quantum physics, is to love, to serve, to create, to connect, or in one sentence, it is to elevate our soul. And the meaning of life is given by the kinds of and amount of positive information we bring about. So now let's ask a profound question. What is the most alive thing in the universe? What system has the greatest capacity to maintain, develop, enhance, and transmit positive information? And the answer, I believe, is the Tao itself, the source and the fundamental essence of all things. The Tao is the ultimate living system. It is a universal quantum vibrational field that contains and connects with everything. And it is the infinite source of positive information. And we as human beings are expressions of the Tao. We carry within us the capacity to connect with this infinite source, to draw upon its wisdom, its love, and to express it in our lives. So we will explore this further in our future episode. So now let's talk about something deeply practical. What does the quantum theory of life, quantum theory of life, tell us about sickness? Current medicine is extraordinarily powerful in many ways. It can remove tumor, fight infections, repair broken bones, but it has a fundamental limitation. It treats symptoms. It addresses the physical and chemical manifestations of disease. But it Does not always reach the root cause. So according to the quantum theory of life, the root cause of sickness is a significant increase in negative information or a significant decrease in positive information within a life system's quantum field. So in other words, sickness begins with a disruption in the quantum field, a loss of coherence, a loss of connection, a loss of harmony before it manifests as a physical symptom. So this is what the ancient spiritual traditions have been saying for thousands of years. In Chinese medicine, disease arises from disruption in the flow of qi, of energy and information. In Taoism and Buddhism and teachings, sickness is related to karma, to the accumulated negative information from past actions and experiences. And in Christian tradition, soul sickness is associated with sin, with actions that creates disconnection and disharmony. And the quantum theory of life provides a scientific framework that unites, unifies all of this ancient insights. So sickness, the accumulation of negative information in the quantum field is the root cause of physical illness, emotional distress, relationship difficulties, and financial challenges. And this means that the most effective healing addresses the quantum field directly. Soul healing, the transformation of negative information into positive information is not a metaphor. It is a quantum process. When we transform the information in the quantum field, the energy and matter naturally follow. Healing happens at the deepest level. So this is why the spiritual healing techniques that Master Shah's and other spiritual teachers teach, the chanting, the blessing, the forgiveness practices and Tao transmissions are so powerful. They're not just spiritual rituals. They are quantum information transformations. They are shifting the quantum field from negative to positive, from disorder to order, from disconnection to connection. So now let me turn to one of the most exciting implications of the quantum theory of life, the search for extraterrestrial life. So for decades, the search for life beyond Earth has been guided by biological definitions of life. We look for liquid water because Earth's life needs water. We look for carbon-based chemistry because Earth's life is carbon-based. We look for conditions similar to Earth because Earth is the only example of life we know. But if life is a quantum phenomenon, if life is any system that systematically maintains and enhances positive information, then the search for extraterrestrial life become vastly more open. Life could exist in forms we have never imagined. It could exist in plasma environments, in the cores of stars, in the pure light, in the quantum vacuum of deep space. It could be based on entirely different chemistry or no chemistry at all in the conventional sense, as long as the system exhibits sustained quantum coherence, entanglement, and systematic reduction of entropy, as long as it maintains and enhances positive information systematically, it qualifies a life by our definition. So this is a revolutionary expansion of search for life. It means that the universe may be far more alive than we have imagined. It means that we are not alone, not just in the sense that other planets might harbor biological organisms, but in a deeper sense that the universe itself may be teeming with life in forms we have yet to discover. And many spiritual masters and many of us maybe have already experienced contact with other forms of life. Now we may be approaching a scientific framework that allows us to connect with them systematically and learn from them. So how do we use what our understanding from the quantum theory of life to elevate our life? So first, this theory gives us a clear answer how to elevate our life. It is through increased positive information in our quantum field. So here I want to mention a few powerful ways to do this. First, we all know love compassion is the most powerful generators of positive information in the universe. When we love, truly, unconditionally love, we create quantum coherence and entanglement between yourself and others. You increase the positive information in your field and in the field of those you love. And this is why every spiritual tradition places love at the center of the past to enlightenment. And second, forgiveness. Resentment, anger, grievance are forms of negative information. They create disconnection, disharmony in our quantum field. And forgiveness is the act of transforming that negative information into positive information. It is one of the most powerful healing practices available to us. And the third is the service. When we serve others, when you give your time, your energy, your love, your wisdom for the benefits of others, you are creating connection and harmony. You are generating positive information, not just in your own field, but in the fields of those you serve and in the collective field of humanity. So another way is the force is a spiritual practice. Meditations, prayers, chanting, and other spiritual practices are powerful tools for enhancing positive information in our quantum field. They create coherence, it dissolves negative information, they brings powerful positive information inside of us, and they connect us to the universal quantum field, to the Tao, which the source, the infinite source of positive information. And finally, I want to mention the gratitude. Gratitude is a recognition of the positive information that already exists in your life. When you are grateful, you magnify the positive information in your field. When you strengthen your connection with the people and experiences that have enriched your life. When you live in greater connection with your soul and with the source, then you can express your unique gifts in service of the greater good and you are fulfilling life in a more profound and deep way. So we are standing at a remarkable moment in human history. With the advent of AI robots and other techniques, it now becomes possible that we no longer have to worry or struggle for physical survival. We can now all focus on elevating our life to its true purpose, higher meaning and potential. And our life is not just to elevate our own life, but to elevate the life of all. So the question what is life is not just a scientific question. It is the most personal question there is. Because we are life. And understanding what life is at the deepest quantum level is understanding what we are. We are a quantum field extending over all space and time, capable of systematically maintaining, developing, enhancing, transmitting positive information, the connection, order, and harmony, not only within ourselves, and we are with all beings. We are connected to every other living field in the universe. We are the expression of the Tao, the infinite, internal source of all creation. And our purpose and our deepest and most profound purpose is to love, to serve, to connect, to create, to elevate our soul and all souls, to increase the positive information within ourselves, in others, and in the world. Our life is not for survival alone, but also to connect with all beings and to enhance the connection among all beings. And this is to enhance the life of all beings. So this is what life is, and this is what we are. So I invite you to ask yourself in every moment, am I increasing positive information right now? Am I creating connection or disconnection? Order or disorder? Harmony or disharmony? And to make the choice again and again, in every moment, to choose life, to choose love, to choose compassion. So thank you for being with me on Unified Signs of Everything. Until next time, keep feeling and connecting with who you truly are. And with all beings. Choose to enhance your life and all life every moment. So the reference to our paper is available in the show notes. If this episode resonates with you, please share it, leave a review, and join us next time as we continue to explore the deepest mystery of our existence.

SPEAKER_00 35:13

Thank you for listening to the Unified Science of Everything with Dr. Ruling Shu. If you're inspired by today's journey, please subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with someone you love. Remember, you are not just the witness to creation, you are its co creator.