Life as we do not know it
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Authors
Publication Date
2021-11-26Journal Title
Proceedings of the International Conference on Thermodynamics
Conference Name
International Conference on Thermodynamics 2.0
Publisher
International Association for the Integration of Science and Engineering (IAISAE)
Type
Conference Object
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AM
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Banerjee, S. (2021). Life as we do not know it. Proceedings of the International Conference on Thermodynamics https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.78696
Abstract
Information plays a critical role in complex biological
systems. This article proposes a role for information processing
in questions around the origin of life and suggests how
computational simulations may yield insights into questions
related to the origin of life. Such a computational model of the
origin of life would unify thermodynamics with information
processing and we would gain an appreciation of why proteins
and nucleotides evolved as the substrate of computation and
information processing in living systems that we see on Earth.
Answers to questions like these may give us insights into noncarbon
based forms of life that we could search for outside
Earth.
I hypothesize that carbon-based life forms are only one
amongst a continuum of life-like systems in the universe.
Investigations into the role of computational substrates that
allow information processing is important and could yield
insights into:
1) novel non-carbon based computational substrates that
may have “life-like” properties, and
2) how life may have actually originated from non-life on
Earth. Life may exist as a continuum between non-life and life
and we may have to revise our notion of life and how common it
is in the universe.
Looking at life or life-like phenomena through the lens of
information theory may yield a broader view of life.
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.78696
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/331251
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