

The Information Theory of Biology & Origins of Life with Sara Imari Walker (Big Biology Podcast Crossover)
50 snips Aug 12, 2020
Guest Sara Imari Walker discusses the information theory of biology and origins of life. Topics include the relation between information, matter, and energy, the search for a fundamental understanding of life, the emergence of life on Earth, the role of information in defining life's principles, the challenges of reductionism in biology, self-replication theories, major transitions in biology linked to information processing, and the interconnectedness of life as a system from biology to AI.
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Information and Life
- Study living things to understand information's role in the physical world.
- Life's origins mark a transition where information begins controlling system dynamics.
Early Life's History
- Earliest fossil evidence suggests complex life existed 3.8 billion years ago.
- The exact timing and environment of life's emergence remain speculative.
LUCA and Early Life
- All life on Earth shares the same core biochemistry, indicating a last universal common ancestor (LUCA).
- LUCA likely existed as a community of cells with horizontal gene transfer.