IUBio

A possible definition of life.

Ed Rybicki ed at MOLBIOL.UCT.AC.ZA
Wed Apr 23 03:56:09 EST 1997


James Foster wrote:
 > 
 > Enter this on your unix workstation: mv 'which mv' new.copy.mv
 > That will replicate your copy command.  

Er...don't got no unix workstation...sorry, your life-form does not 
operate in this universe.

So:

"Life is the phenomenon associated with the self-replication of 
self-coding informational systems".

I like it about as well as the rabidly Dawkinist "Life: the result of 
non-random survival of randomly varying replicators".

                     Ed Rybicki, PhD  
      Dept Microbiology     |   ed at molbiol.uct.ac.za   
   University of Cape Town  | rybicki at uctvms.uct.ac.za
   Private Bag, Rondebosch  |  phone: x27-21-650-3265
      7700, South Africa    |   fax: x27-21-689 7573
    WWW URL: http://www.uct.ac.za/microbiology/ed.html      
                                        
"Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time..."



More information about the Mol-evol mailing list

Send comments to us at biosci-help [At] net.bio.net