There is no strict delineation between life and not life, and neither is there one between intelligent life and non-intelligent life. You can find all sorts of gradations. A roundworm has 300 neurons, is there consciousness? A bacteria has none, is it life? If bacteria is still life, how about a virus? It’s not even a cell! It’s somewhere in between life and not life.

Life is just a chemical process. The universe itself is an indivisible play of matter/energy, all objects and all concepts are that of the human brain. Consciousness itself is a concept of the human mind, the dreaming mind.