Controversial Nature Paper on the Evolution of Life and the Universe

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This chapter discusses a controversial paper published in Nature that explores the connection between physics and biology. The paper argues that physics alone is not sufficient to explain the emergence of biology and that there is a disconnect between the two fields. The chapter also touches on the title of the paper, the preprint server publication, and the author's thoughts on the interest and impact of the paper.

Lee Cronin is a chemist at University of Glasgow. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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Transcript: https://lexfridman.com/lee-cronin-3-transcript

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Nature Paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06600-9
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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(09:37) – Assembly theory paper
(30:06) – Assembly equation
(43:19) – Discovering alien life
(1:01:38) – Evolution of life on Earth
(1:09:34) – Response to criticism
(1:27:12) – Kolmogorov complexity
(1:39:02) – Nature review process
(1:59:56) – Time and free will
(2:06:21) – Communication with aliens
(2:28:19) – Cellular automata
(2:32:48) – AGI
(2:49:36) – Nuclear weapons
(2:55:22) – Chem Machina
(3:08:16) – GPT for electron density
(3:17:46) – God