The Cosmic Tardigrade: Taxis-like Self-Organization in Interstellar Object 3I/ATLAS

This preprint presents a two-layer investigation of interstellar object 3I/ATLAS (C/2025 N1). Layer I documents the confirmed observational record: a persistently collimated sunward anti-tail jet, a three-jet system with 120-degree angular symmetry sustained across multiple epochs, an anomalous A2/A1 non-gravitational acceleration ratio approximately 4–7 times that of typical comets, and an unprecedented CO₂-to-H₂O ratio of 8:1. It also includes the author’s real-time tracking of the JPL Small Body Database orbital solution across the Jupiter closest approach on March 16, 2026 — a 33-day observational gap during which no new data were incorporated and no solution update was issued.Layer II proposes the Taxis-like Self-Organization (TSO) hypothesis: that 3I/ATLAS may exhibit functional analogs to biological taxis — directional responses to environmental gradients — as an emergent property of matter subjected to interstellar conditions over approximately seven billion years. The operative analogy is not a spacecraft, but a tardigrade: matter organized over vast time to respond systematically to its environment without cognition or intent.