Organisms Are Not Replicators

An organism is the sort of thing, such as an animal plant or microbe, which in everyday terms we usually think of as being alive. But it follows from what I have said that alive is at best a courtesy title when applied to the parts of an organism other than its DNA. In everyday parlance, we speak of organisms reproducing themselves. This was one of the supposed characteristics of living things but this is inaccurate. Organisms are not copied during reproduction. Far less do they cause their own copying. They are constructed afresh, according to the blueprints embodied in the parent organism's DNA. The genes for manufacturing that food exist only in other organisms. And the genes for manufacturing