What Is Life? : Investigating the Nature of Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology

by Ed Regis

• ISBN13: 9780374288518
• ISBN10: 0374288518
• Format: Trade Book
• Copyright: 2008-04-01
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Summary

In 1944, the Nobel Prizewinning physicist Erwin Schrodinger published a groundbreaking little book calledWhat Is Life?In fewer than one hundred pages, he argued that life was not a mysterious or inexplicable phenomenon, as many people believed, but a scientific process like any other, ultimately explainable by the laws of physics and chemistry. Today, more than sixty years later, members of a new generation of scientists are attempting to create life from the ground up. Science has moved forward in leaps and bounds since Schrodinger's time, but our understanding of what does and does not constitute life has only grown more complex. An era that has already seen computer chipimplanted human brains, genetically engineered organisms, genetically modified foods, cloned mammals, and brain-dead humans kept "alive" by machines is one that demands fresh thinking about the concept of life. While a segment of our national debate remains stubbornly mired in moral quandaries over abortion, euthanasia, and other "right to life" issues, the science writer Ed Regis demonstrates how science can and does provide us with a detailed understanding of the nature of life. Written in a lively and accessible style, and synthesizing a wide range of contemporary research,What Is Life?is a brief and illuminating contribution to an age-old debate.

Author Biography

Ed Regis, who holds a PhD in philosophy from New York University, is a full-time science writer, contributing to Scientific American, Harper’s Magazine, Wired, Discover, and The New York Times, among other periodicals. He is the author of several books, including The Biology of Doom.

Table of Contents

Prologue: The Second Creation	p. 3
Birth of a Cell	p. 9
Schrodinger	p. 26
Unlocking the Three Secrets of Life	p. 42
The Fiftieth-Anniversary Coronation and Dismissal	p. 60
ATP and the Meaning of Life	p. 74
Origins	p. 89
The Spandrels of San Marco	p. 105
The Twilight Zone	p. 125
The Synthetic Cell Turing Test	p. 140
What Is Life?	p. 156
Notes	p. 173
Bibliography	p. 179
Acknowledgments	p. 189
Index	p. 191
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.