"According to Plato, the Demiurge creates a living and intelligent universe because life is better than non-life and intelligent life is better than mere life. . . In contrast with the Darwinian view that the emergence of life and mind are accidents of evolution, the Timaeus holds that the universe, the world, is necessarily alive and intelligent. And mortal organisms are a microcosm of the great macrocosm."

Richard McDonough, "Plato's Organicism," Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy