Vital phenomena definition series#

Likewise, the popular encyclopedia Wikipedia define life as “a characteristic that distinguishes physical entities that have biological processes …. We can also say that life is a wonderful and ever-changing process that occurs in highly organized receptacles that we identify as living entities. For example, we can define life as the period from birth to death or as the condition that occurs only in living organisms. We can define life in very different ways depending on the context and the focus we want to give to the definition.

Even some scientists and philosophers of science suggest that it is not possible to define life. However, despite its importance there is no widely accepted definition of what life is and some of the most commonly employed definitions (see below) face problems, often in the form of robust counter-examples. Koonin wrote about the complexity of defining life: “In my view, although life definitions are metaphysical rather than strictly scientific propositions, they are far from being pointless and have potential to yield genuine biological insights”.

Clark, a definition of life is needed more than ever before to provide defendable objective criteria for searches for life on other planets, to recognize critical distinctions between machine life and robots, to provide insight into laboratory approaches to creating test-tube life, to understand the profound changes that occurred during the origin of life, and to clarify the central process of the discipline of biology.

Vital phenomena definition series#

) and I myself have proposed a series of principles (named as the commandments of life) to explain and understand the vital phenomenon from an evolutionary perspective, far from any vitalist, pseudo-scientific or supernatural considerations. Regarding the principles governing life, there have been several contributions from different perspectives (e.g. However, despite these enormous advances, biology still lacks a solid theoretical framework necessary to understand the vital phenomenon and to answer questions such as what is life? or are viruses living entities? To answer these and other fundamental questions related to life, in addition to the universal laws of physics, biology needs its own principles to help us find answers to major theoretical challenges such as the origin of life, the construction and maintenance of genomes, or the concept of life itself. Today, thanks to the enormous advance of Biology, we know and understand much better the vital phenomenon, the molecular biology of the cells, the enormous biodiversity on our planet, the evolutionary process, and the complexity of ecosystems. Life is a wonderful natural process that occurs in highly organized dynamic structures that we call living beings. Finally, I argue that if there were life elsewhere in the universe, it would be very similar to what we know on this planet because the laws of physics and the composition of matter are universal and because of the principle of the inexorability of life. I base this conclusion on the fact that viruses satisfy all the vital characteristics common to all living things and on the role they have played in the evolution of species. Taking as a starting point my definition of life and, of course, on what others have thought about it, I am in favor of considering viruses as living beings. I also wonder whether viruses can be considered living things or not. If life is the process, living beings are the system in which this process takes place. Thus, I define life as a process that takes place in highly organized organic structures and is characterized by being preprogrammed, interactive, adaptative and evolutionary.

The specific objective of this brief reflection is to offer an alternative vision to the definition of life taking as a starting point the traits common to all living beings. Many traditional biological concepts continue to be debated by biologists, scientists and philosophers of science.