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The Demon in the Machine: How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life de Paul Davies

The Demon in the Machine: How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life

Autor Paul Davies
en Limba Engleză Hardback – 16 oct 2019

Subliniem, încă din primele pagini, că The Demon in the Machine nu este o simplă trecere în revistă a biologiei moleculare, ci o investigație metodologică asupra modului în care informația organizează materia vie. Paul Davies își structurează argumentația plecând de la o lacună istorică: deși Darwin a explicat evoluția speciilor, natura fundamentală a vieții a rămas un mister pentru fizica clasică. Autorul propune o abordare interdisciplinară, organizată riguros în șapte capitole care ghidează cititorul de la mecanismele celulare la complexitatea conștiinței, folosind conceptul de „demon” al lui Maxwell ca metaforă pentru procesarea informației la scară microscopică.

Observăm un progres logic clar: după stabilirea premiselor în capitolele introductive, Davies introduce „Logica vieții” și „Darwinism 2.0”, sugerând că algoritmii și codurile digitale sunt la fel de reale în celule precum sunt în computere. Această perspectivă transformă biologia dintr-o știință a substanțelor într-una a fluxurilor de date. Cititorii familiarizați cu From Matter to Life de Sara Imari Walker vor aprecia modul în care Davies extinde dezbaterea despre tranziția de la materie la viață, oferind o claritate conceptuală sporită asupra modului în care organismele „conjura” ordinea din haos.

În contextul operei sale, acest volum reprezintă o rafinare a temelor explorate anterior în Information and the Nature of Reality. Dacă în lucrările trecute Davies analiza informația ca fundament al realității fizice, aici se concentrează pe aplicabilitatea ei practică în medicină și tehnologie, discutând despre motoarele moleculare și navigația păsărilor prin prisma fizicii cuantice. Textul reușește să integreze domenii aparent disparate, precum oncologia și nanotehnologia, sub o singură umbrelă teoretică, oferind o viziune unitară asupra mecanismelor care fac viața posibilă.

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Specificații

ISBN-13: 9780226669700
ISBN-10: 022666970X
Pagini: 272
Ilustrații: 16 halftones
Dimensiuni: 152 x 229 x 25 mm
Greutate: 0.59 kg
Ediția:First Edition
Editura: University of Chicago Press
Colecția University of Chicago Press

De ce să citești această carte

Recomandăm această carte cititorilor care doresc să înțeleagă biologia dincolo de descrierile descriptive. Veți câștiga o perspectivă nouă asupra modului în care celulele funcționează ca sisteme de procesare a informației, similar computerelor. Este o lectură esențială pentru cei pasionați de fizică teoretică și astrobiologie, oferind răspunsuri argumentate științific la una dintre cele mai vechi întrebări ale umanității: ce anume separă materia vie de cea inertă?

Despre autor

Paul Charles William Davies este un fizician englez de renume mondial, scriitor și profesor la Arizona State University, unde conduce centrul BEYOND pentru concepte fundamentale în știință. Cu o carieră academică impresionantă la Cambridge și University College London, Davies s-a specializat în cosmologie, teoria cuantică a câmpurilor și astrobiologie. Este o voce autoritară în explorarea spațială, ocupând funcții de conducere în grupuri de lucru SETI și METI. Expertiza sa vastă îi permite să traducă concepte matematice și fizice complexe într-un limbaj accesibil, fiind unul dintre cei mai respectați comunicatori de știință contemporani.

Descriere scurtă

Physics World Book of the Year

A Financial Times, Sunday Times, and Telegraph Best Science Book of the Year

What is life? For generations, scientists have struggled to make sense of this fundamental question, for life really does look like magic: even a humble bacterium accomplishes things so dazzling that no human engineer can match it. Huge advances in molecular biology over the past few decades have served only to deepen the mystery.

In this penetrating and wide-ranging book, world-renowned physicist and science communicator Paul Davies searches for answers in a field so new and fast-moving that it lacks a name; it is a domain where biology, computing, logic, chemistry, quantum physics, and nanotechnology intersect. At the heart of these diverse fields, Davies explains, is the concept of information: a quantity which has the power to unify biology with physics, transform technology and medicine, and force us to fundamentally reconsider what it means to be alive—even illuminating the age-old question of whether we are alone in the universe.

From life’s murky origins to the microscopic engines that run the cells of our bodies, The Demon in the Machine journeys across an astounding landscape of cutting-edge science. Weaving together cancer and consciousness, two-headed worms and bird navigation, Davies reveals how biological organisms garner and process information to conjure order out of chaos, opening a window onto the secret of life itself.

Notă biografică

Paul Davies is a theoretical physicist, cosmologist, astrobiologist, broadcaster, and bestselling author of more than twenty books. A winner of the prestigious Templeton Prize, he is Regents' Professor of physics and director of the Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at Arizona State University.

Cuprins

Preface

1. What is Life?
2. Enter the Demon
3. The Logic of Life
4. Darwinism 2.0
5. Spooky Life and Quantum Demons
6. Almost a Miracle
7. The Ghost in the Machine

Epilogue
Further Reading
Notes
Illustration Credits
Index

Recenzii

“Brilliantly vivid. . . . The big idea is that . . . understanding the information flow in organisms might be the missing part of our scientific jigsaw puzzle. The informational approach, in Davies’s elegant and lucid exposition, is extremely promising.”

“Boundary-transcending. . . . Davies claims that life’s defining characteristics are better understood in terms of information. . . . With apologies to Charles Darwin, there is grandeur in this view of life.”

“Important and imaginative.”

“Wonderful. . . . Davies is a lucid writer and master storyteller. . . . Truly mind-blowing. . . . This is a cracking read.”

“Fascinating. . . . This book is no lightweight holiday read you can laze through.”

“A dizzying tour de force.”

“Explaining one of the oldest questions—what is life?—is physicist Davies’s quest. . . . He searches for answers beyond the known, venturing into a place with no name.”

"Davies’s lucid writing on this emerging scientific area is just what the pop-sci reader ordered. He is the perfect host to this admittedly dizzying journey, as he spins yarns of quantum demons, double-headed worms and everything in-between."

“Davies narrates a gripping new drama in science, in which the plot is the story of life and the leading actor is information. With his characteristic blend of erudition and clarity, he brings together some of the most rapidly advancing knowledge in physics and technology to show how information controls biology. If you want to understand how the concept of life is changing, read this.”

“This is one of the most exciting books I have read in years. Davies celebrates a significant anniversary with a demonically brilliant investigation of a fundamental question that only the very latest science and philosophy can deal with. Now we have a view from the master that's as thrilling as it is satisfying. Superb.”

“Davies takes us on a fascinating tour of what is known about what life is. Along the way he speculates interestingly about what may become known. His theme, drawn from Darwin, Schrödinger, Turing, Gödel, Shannon, and von Neumann, is that what separates life from non-life is *information.* But how? Exploring that question illuminates biology by revealing its deep roots in physics, mathematics, and computer science.”

“In this characteristically clearly written and engaging book, ranging from physics to biology and evolutionary theory to neuroscience, Davies strongly makes the case that at its core, life is about information flows.”

“Davies is a courageous explorer of the boundaries of what we can know about our world. This book makes his explorations available to all who enjoy pushing those boundaries. Written with a light entertaining touch, even the most abstruse science acquires the clarity of exposition for which the author is justly renowned.”

“A tour-de-force. . . . The Demon in the Machine is simultaneously rigorous, state-of-the-art, and highly readable—very hard to put down.”

“Davies always probes the deepest questions in science. Here, addressing the deepest of all—Schrödinger’s What is Life?—he tells us what life is: matter plus information—beyond the laws of physics, but compatible with them. To elaborate this thesis, he deploys his trademark talent: getting to the heart of the most abstruse and technical aspects of science (biology as well as physics), without jargon and with down-to-earth analogies.”

“This creative demon shadows DNA and the promise of quantum computing, answering some basic questions. What is consciousness, why is life so good at predicting where it might go next? The bridge connecting fundamental physics, biology, and the most advanced labs of computation is what Davies calls information patterns. He shows how it organizes for top-down creativity, and thereby holds off the grim reaper of entropy. With striking insight, and metaphors that illuminate the landscape of science today, Davies once again becomes our guide to the near future.”

“The Demon in the Machine encompasses some of the most intriguing and unsolved mysteries of the universe: the existence of an arrow of time imprinted on the cosmos, and the emergence of life itself. Davies's crisp but rich narrative succeeds in untangling various highly complex ideas and processes, while fluently and intelligently setting out its own arrow of argument.”

"This work analyzes the properties of life from the perspective of atomic physics, arguing that the very nature of living things allows them to defy the second fundamental law of physics: namely, that there is a 'tendency towards degeneration and disorder.'... Along with treating the question 'What is life?' this book explains the fundamental principles of quantum physics, making a very complex subject more understandable."

"This book is really about whether a physicist can define what life is, and the living systems that are far from equilibrium, yet maintain high-order...It’s one of those books where you read a few pages, then you lean back and think and go, 'Oh, I hadn’t thought of it that way.'"

"Davies offers a similar message . . . : information, like energy, has the ability to animate matter. ‘In each and every one of us lies a message,’ writes Davies. ‘It is inscribed in an ancient code, its beginnings lost in the mists of time. Decrypted, the message contains instructions on how to make a human being. Nobody wrote the message; nobody invented the code. They came into existence spontaneously.’"

"Davies is struck by the way living organisms consistently resist the ravages of entropy that all forms of inanimate matter are subject to and argues that there must be some non-physical principle allowing living matter to defy the Second Law of Thermodynamics. This non-physical principle is information. Throughout the book, Davies explores all the different ways that information is an essential component of biological processes, especially at the cellular and molecular levels."

"For Davies, life is a data processing system. That is his demon from the machine. It is one of the books where you read a couple of pages; you then lean back and go and think, 'Oh, I had not thought of it like that.'"

"The Demon in the Machine will have broad appeal. Experts looking to make their way from disciplinary silos, and better understand the promise of scientific thinking as it relates to information, will find what they are looking for. At the same time, novices who want to better understand the current state of science will be aptly rewarded."