What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
whatislife.ie
What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
1–10 of 40 posts
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#2Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_Life%3F
"In the book, Schrödinger introduced the idea of an "aperiodic crystal" that contained genetic information in its configuration of covalent chemical bonds."
Good to see it available (a classic; not so easy to lay hands on)
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#3Freeman Dyson reviews and extends "What is Life?" in his "Origins of Life," both a lecture[1] and a book.
[1] http://inspirehep.net/record/1268726/files/978-4-431-77056-5...
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#4Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_Life%3F "In the book, Schrödinger introduced the idea of an "aperiodic crystal" that contained genetic information in its configuration of covalent chemical bonds." Good to see it available (a classic; not so easy to lay hands on)
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#5A miserable pile of organic molecules. But enough talk...Have at you!
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#6I took a course on History of Science and I was pretty shocked to learn that Watson, Crick and Wilkins were deeply impacted by this book. That type of cross pollination between disciplines and generations of scientists is fascinating.
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#7It's remarkable how much this still rings true today.
The idea that we should try and understand life as a battle against the second law of thermodynamics has had a significant influence on many of today's great thinkers - such as Friston [1] and Dennett [2], as well as countless others.
[1] https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsif.201...
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#8Our definition of life is very narrow, mostly self-referential. Life is everything. Just because we can't consciously communicate with something it doesn't mean it's not alive. Why wouldn't Earth be alive? How about the sun, the stars and the universe?
We love separating things by arbitrarily naming and defining them, but the universe is completely connected, we can't exist outside of it or disconnected from it. If anything, the only life that exists is the entire universe and we are just tiny tiny pieces of it with a very limited view and awareness of the whole. Pretty much the same way we are made up of billions of cells that likely have no way of perceiving the human body they are a part of (or "having a conversation" with it).
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#9It's remarkable how much this still rings true today. The idea that we should try and understand life as a battle against the second law of thermodynamics has had a significant influence on many of today's great thinkers - such as Friston [1] and Dennett [2], as well as countless others. [1] https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsif.201... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ1YxR8qNpY
Thermodynamics and heat dissipation also play a central role in Jeremy England’s work on abiogenesis.
Re: What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger (1944) [pdf]
#10What is life? A forkbomb implemented in hardware.