We need new metaphors that put life at the centre of biology | Aeon Essays
the life sciences have come to see organisms as biochemical algorithms.
Yuval Noah Harari • Homo Deus
Too often, causation in biology, as indeed in the world in general, has been assumed to start “at the bottom” and filter up—so that, for instance, characteristics at the level of an organism’s traits are deemed to be “caused” by genes. As we’ll see, we can gain a better understanding of how life works, and how to intervene in it effectively, when w
... See morePhilip Ball • How Life Works: A User’s Guide to the New Biology
Brenner was in a thoughtful mood, drinking sherry before dinner at King’s College. When he began working with Crick, less than two decades before, molecular biology did not even have a name. Two decades later, in the 1990s, scientists worldwide would undertake the mapping of the entire human genome: perhaps 20,000 genes, 3 billion base pairs. What
... See moreJames Gleick • The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
These hypotheses suggest that deep principles govern the emergence of problem-solving matter, principles that push our understanding of modern physics and chemistry towards their limits. They mark a radical departure from life as we once knew it.
Chris Kempes • Is Life a Complex Computational Process? | Aeon Essays
What if instead a radio simply is not the right analogy—if biology doesn’t work like any engineered system we have ever created? What if its operational logic is fundamentally different? Then we will need something more than a better formal language. We will need a new way of thinking—albeit not one that need invoke any mysterious vital force. I be
... See morePhilip Ball • How Life Works: A User’s Guide to the New Biology
