Biological Time, Evolutionary Optimization, and Gauge Coherence: A Thermodynamic Synthesis of the Principle of Biological Time Equivalence

Biological theory usually treats time as an external chronological variable against which growth, aging, and ecological change are parametrized. Yet living systems also generate an internal measure of duration through physiological cycling and irreversible entropy production, and the regularities of allometric lifespan scaling, biological clocks, life-history evolution, ecological synchronization, and disease are ordinarily studied in isolation rather than within a single thermodynamic internal-time framework. The Principle of Biological Time Equivalence (PBTE) proposes such a framework.