How matter becomes life, in 7 minutes | Lee Cronin

“The physics of the universe doesn't predict the emergence of biology.” Renowned chemist Lee Cronin explains how inanimate matter becomes evolutionary.
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What is life, really? Despite our scientific advancements, we still don’t really know.
Lee Cronin, the Regis Professor of Chemistry at the University of Glasgow, says there is a significant disconnect between the physics of the universe and the biological processes we observe. This discrepancy makes for a difficult challenge in understanding how inanimate matter evolves into breathing, thinking, life forms.
The solution? Cronin proposes assembly theory - where we use complexity at scale to piece together all the components that work together to create adaptable life. Assembly theory suggests that life emerges through two key processes: copying and existence. These two simple words, Cronin explains, are the essential essences of life as we know it.
Thanks to Cronin, this theory has been put in use by NASA in its search for lifeforms on other planets. Together, we are growing closer to understanding the mystery of life - how it started, what it looks like, and how it might evolve.
Read the full video transcript: bigthink.com/t...
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[@manyhundegu3939]

The right title for this video is "We still don't know how matter becomes life, in 7 minutes"

[@antoniussukardi9029]

The title is a click bait

[@Philosia]

This answer cannot be given by any kind of objective research because it is about us and we are not part of it. The subjective scientific research scientist ie spiritually awakened person can only give some hint and that is tried in this video. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hKOQqYepjLOmqK8

[@roberttombs3108]

Or, "Liberals assume there is no God after 7 minutes of making no sense."

[@chrism.1131]

@@roberttombs3108 as a liberal… I resemble that remark.

[@user-mu3qc7zs8y]

😅 Almost all serious scientists agree AT is not only fundamentally false (and intrinsically incapable of doing what their authors claim it to do) and a self-promotion overhype, but also weak plagiarism.

[@tyranmcgrath6871]

Interesting interpretation. I thought he was going to explain how inanimate matter became life.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@tyranmcgrath6871 kzbin.info/www/bejne/eZykgZuQZ7aAnZYsi=1OT9sbblZTBz-mfm

[@books4739]

this is why I read comments before watching videos 😂

[@husanerupam5064]

​@@books4739 I also. 😄

[@ericherman5413]

Essentially it did, if you go back far enough

[@user-yd2wk6bp6s]

If at all anyone knows this !!

[@RexDavid]

7 minutes of no answers is what it is

[@skyplanet9858]

Well said.

[@KINGFAROOQ1216]

Unreal this is my fourth go around because I'm certain I'm missing something here

[@AustinThomasPhD]

There are other videos and articles covering his publication (much longer, of course) that do a much, much better job covering assembly theory. It is quite interesting.

[@stefan24georgiev]

well we don't have a context-invariant theory of viability , a semantic information theory, and a theory of order(negentropy was supposed to be exactly that , , but didn't work out), that's why we don't know what life is. Until we figure these few things out we wont know how to solve it, One problem I see with Lee Cronin's Assembly theory is he uses Syntactic (Shannon) information, the problem with Shannon information is there is no meaning in it. Essentially we are stuck in our Vienna Circle paradigms. That's why we cant solve this.

[@markaurelius61]

There is no answer.

[@OtterFlys]

I was gob smacked at Cronin’s statement about finding the iPhone on Mars, and that it would take finding several of them that still worked to convince him that they were not of natural origin. There is a killing lack of the ability to recognize design in the origin of life community.

[@antoniussukardi9029]

Even finding 1 iphone should convince you it is not naturally occurring

[@SydWalker3k]

As Professor Cronin says, one self-assembled iPhone discovered on the surface of Mars could be an accident. But two or more iPhones would definitely make scientists suspicious. Surprising that Cronind didn't mention another obvious obvious point: it takes two iPhones to reproduce sexually, which facilitates more rapid iPhone evolution. Really, it's all so simple! Existence and copying - that's all we need to know! Amazing no-one noticed that before!

[@pavelshalnwv8494]

Ability to recognize: DISABLED That's what anti God religion does to mind

[@liamlieblein6375]

What's weird is that, even according to his own theory (Assembly theory), just one iphone *should* be enough too. This is because of just how high the assembly index is for that kind of artifact, just how many steps it would take to assemble an iphone. I'm not sure why he's explaining his theory like he is here, it definitely does not capture the real core of the theory in any way.

[@keithpadgett8417]

He simply took Paley’s watch example, broke it in pieces and then was dumbfounded that he couldn’t figure out how it worked! No answers here, mere double talk and straw men.

[@georgebond7777]

The question should be, whare did the prescriptive information and decision making algorithms in the genome come from.

[@roddacanay1182]

DNA is "Coded" and "Digital" Information. "Language: All Digital communications require a formal language, which in this context consists of all the information that the sender and receiver of the digital communication must both possess, in advance, in order for the communication to be successful." (Wikipedia: Digital Data) During an interview, when asked if the genetic code is really a code, Dr. Richard Dawkins answered, “It [the genetic code] IS a code. It's definitely a code.” (Source: Jon Perry - Genetics & Evolution Stated Casually KZbin Channel Interview with Dr. Richard Dawkins on 4-2-2022. Dr. Richard Dawkins is widely regarded as the world’s foremost expert on Darwinian Evolution) "After Watson and Crick, we know that genes themselves, within their minute internal structure, are long strings of pure digital information. What is more, they are truly digital..." (Richard Dawkins, River out of Eden, 16. Dr. Richard Dawkins is widely regarded as the world’s foremost expert on Darwinian Evolution) "It is only at the semantic level that we really have meaningful information; thus, we may establish the following theorem: Theorem 14: Any entity, to be accepted as information, must entail semantics; it must be meaningful. Semantics is an essential aspect of information because the meaning is the only invariant property. The statistical and syntactical properties can be altered appreciably when information is represented in another language (e.g., translated into Chinese), but the meaning does not change. Meanings always represent mental concepts; therefore, we have: Theorem 15: When its progress along the chain of transmission events is traced backward, every piece of information leads to a mental source, the mind of the sender." Dr. Werner Gitt (Former Head of the Department of Information Technology at Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, Germany) What prebiotically relevant or even modern chemical process has been observed in nature or experimentally demonstrated to be capable of producing coded digital functional information / language? Modern scientific discoveries in Genetics (i.e. biology) have shown that functional / coded / digital Information (i.e. DNA code) is at the core of All Biological Systems. Without functional / coded / digital information, there is No biology. The only known source (i.e. cause) in the universe that has been Observed (i.e. Scientific Method) in nature to be capable of producing functional / coded / digital information, such as that found even in the most primitive biological systems, is mind / consciousness / intelligence.

[@texastexas4541]

The title should be "How I can numb your brain for 7 minutes with meaningless ramblings."

[@uthman2281]

Nothing answered

[@dweedum731]

I wouldn't say 'existence' is the 'one word'. I would say 'survival' is the 'one word'. Because even rocks 'exist'. But they don't try to survive. Life tries to survive, and everything else is derived out of the inherent need and desire to survive.

[@KristoferPettersson]

He said existence beyond the natural lifetime of that object which implies some kind of continuation criteria which allow for change (decay) but manage to transfer the important properties to the next observable time frame. You are correct that something "survives" from the original time frame which can lead to a duplication of the original object (as defined by its continuation criteria).

[@moinjay3274]

Spot on!

[@EdwardHinton-qs4ry]

It's two words. Self replication.

[@bogdy72000]

physics is the science of existence . physics deals with objects . in order for an object to exist it has to have shape and location . in the colloquial speech saying concepts exist is pure poppycok .

[@KristoferPettersson]

@@bogdy72000 Doesn't concepts exist? :-) I think you are confused. In mathematics there are many different objects, which exists, but doesn't correspond to physical objects with location and shape.

[@pikador0078]

Lee Cronin is well known for talking a lot and saying nothing. He is the only person who understands and believes in The Assembly Theory.

[@DoreenBellDotan]

Did I miss something? I heard some interesting axioms and definitions, that deserve consideration, but no explanation at all at how the leap is made from rocks grinding to life emerging.

[@ronaldmorgan7632]

You didn't miss anything.

[@cazymike87]

Yes you did. The whole point of his Argument is that a rock is not a living thing because it doesnt copy itself as time passing by, it can shrink and grow physycaly , but will not remain the same. A living thing will do that even if its physycal body will change ( as the rock does) its esence (if you like, the soul , its personality etc ) will endure the passage of time by copying itself every second for every second the time ticks. This is why he said that , we as living things are older than the rocks that made the Earth.

[@edus9636]

Life doesn't emerge, it's natural information in action, that uses the natural laws to mold and manipulate carbon-based matter so it can replicate itself and gain more information. When certain levels or events are achieved, mini-consciousness progresses from instinct to intelligence.

[@julioivansalazar9853]

Some of the criticism towards Assembly Theory can be found on Wikipedia, Hector Zenil's medium post: "The 8 fallacies of Assembly Theory" and two papers by the same author (and others) titled: "On the Salient Limitations of the Methods of Assembly Theory and their Classification of Molecular Biosignatures" (published in npj Systems Biology and Applications) and "Assembly Theory is a weak version of algorithmic complexity based on LZ compression that does not explain or quantify selection or evolution".

[@vnm.eyeless]

If the papers have been uploaded on ArXiv, I would advise caution when taking them into account as "fact", since they are not peer-reviewed.

[@faster6329]

@@vnm.eyeless In this day and age not being peer-reviewed is almost a badge of honor. Peer-reviews have become a impenetrable barrier for any ideas outside stablished mainstream science.

[@anonaki-mt6xb]

@@faster6329 Ah, the perennial struggle against 'Groupthink', as well as the present struggle against deliberately controlled mis- and disinformation.

[@vnm.eyeless]

@@faster6329 Weird or controversial ideas do get peer-reviewed, I would argue they are reviewed earlier and more quickly than "mainstream" science as journals are trying to get attention. Of course, within reason and there will always be biases in one way or another.

[@faster6329]

@@vnm.eyeless I don't know. There are more and more heavy weights in science who say peer reviews has become a barrier to new ideas. It's no use to seek grant money for projects outside mainstream narrative. They say peer review has become a "I scratch your back and you scratch my back" system. They simply back each others ideas and won't let anyone else come in. I've seen too many scientists saying that and I've seen how ideas outside mainstream gets shunned. Personally, I think the peer review system has become corrupt. Just like any other system where a few have the power, we humans will in the end corrupt that system.

[@miguelfalcao]

He just KAMALAHARRISED the beginning of life.

[@michaelvickers8691]

The phrase, word salad, came to mind. But I like yours too.

[@alikigia]

😂

[@wberckmann]

Yup - word salad!

[@syedahmed5539]

Assembly theory sounds Okay at first glance, but the odds of creating a functional folded protein are so enormously great, 10 to the power 174 that it defies all logic, unless one considers that we live in a universe which existed for an infinite period of time or we have to think the most improbable and almost impossible possibility that there is a creator.

[@lastchance8142]

More importantly, that one improbable protein would do nothing but fall apart within hours. Unless an entire "system" of assembly, reactions, and reproduction comes into existence; any improbable chemical products would simply continue reacting until they reached a useless kinetic minimum.

[@syedahmed5539]

@@lastchance8142 You are absolutely right, although for the full ensemble to be organised, within a cellular unit, one has to take into consideration even more unthinkable length of time. So at the end of the day, we're stuck with the idea of a God like creature, who assembled life and kick started the whole process.

[@lastchance8142]

@@syedahmed5539 True, although I wouldn't say "stuck with". The entire appearance of such an exquisitely fine tuned tuned universe, along with a very special planet containing the aforementioned improbable life forms begs the question...what intelligence is behind all this? I find it exhilarating to comptemplate God.

[@FirstLast-xj3xe]

Yeah, so there has to be something to increase the probability... that's part of what he's trying to figure out

[@mariafernandahernandezgarc1836]

While Assembly Theory (AT) proponents might argue it offers a fresh framework, the critique by Dr. Zenil and his team pointing out its equivalence to Shannon entropy and LZ compression (AT being weaker) is not only valid but insightful. AT doesn't introduce fundamentally new insights but rather repackages existing ideas without proper acknowledgment, and claims to do what it can’t fundamentally do. This isn’t merely a matter of academic credit; it’s about maintaining scientific rigor and credibility. By presenting AT as novel without clear citation, its advocates risk misleading the community and distorting the understanding of complexity in biological systems. Moreover, overstating the impact of AT can dilute the significance of more robust, well-established (and more rigorous) methods and concepts.

[@Autepify]

i think what he is talking about is called chemical evolution, im not sure why he didnt say the actual term for it. chemical evolution is whats is hypothesized to have led to the first living cells and is essentially repetitive production of molecules whose interactions with eachother and their environments acts as a selection pressure to form higher order structures (like fatty acid micelles for example)

[@pabloagogo1]

Thanks for explaining this chemical evolution, it sounds interesting.

[@The-Well]

Fascinating insight. Thank you for sharing!

[@gsincs]

@@pabloagogo1 And its a rabbit hole of garbage too.

[@biruk8617]

repetitive production of molecules - students of chemistry and physics with a solid knowledge of thermodynamics find that hard to believe. This is the red line where science ceases to be an explainable fact and instead becomes a cult, faith of some sort. Intellectual dishonesty is the mark of believers. They just believe it. Science is NOT belief! Science is not a vain philosophical argument. Science is a tangible tool that helps humans explain natural phenomena, which, in turn, gives them the advantage to manipulate it for their own purposes. The theory of evolution is "the black hole of Science" where all the rules of physics and chemistry stop working and wishful thinking and belief take over the minds that created it.

[@glennsimonsen8421]

@@pabloagogo1 Yes, interesting if in fact there was such a thing.

[@samuelseguin5685]

I love the simplicity of lee’s explanation. This is a style of teaching, it has punch and it is working. Now I still want the answers…

[@biruk8617]

Synthetic chemist James Tour may have some better explanation.

[@tylusdb]

​@@biruk8617Hes an inorganic chemist, not sure this is in his lane

[@TimJohnston911]

I’m glad the video didn’t really explain how matter became life. We need mystery in our lives, and I think one day science may come to realize that without some focus on spirituality, we will continue to flounder in our search for answers to these important questions.

[@TheRakeshgautam]

Whether any scientist has ever converted any combination of atoms, molecules into life in lab?...in controlled environment, chemistry, cooking etc.

[@galileog8945]

No, and that proves nothing.

[@Pantora10]

Once I was leaving for holidays, I washed a couple of plates and left them on the plastic plate holder to dry. When I came back couple of weeks later I was stunned to see that in the water that stayed in the holder, small black worms were created. Out of nothing, just some water was enough to create life! Since then I believe that water is the creator of life!

[@altsack-edeoja6850]

How did you find out, that "just water" was present?

[@Archimedes616]

I think you're spoofing us, but if not, you might want to look into the "Redi experiment."

[@Nitephall]

How do rocks grinding together create a self-replicating molecule?

[@crazyfakar1]

Grinds to dust, and dust coagulates back into a rock under pressure.

[@user-lt4yd8kh7w]

More like all necesary components for unicelular life in an ocean with the right conditions to form cells, "rocks grinding together" is completely ignoring how it works

[@crazyfakar1]

@@user-lt4yd8kh7w "Rocks grinding together" is exactly what was asked about. The video could have led someone to have other questions, not about cells, but about rocks grinding together.

[@joratto2833]

Natural phenomena can be a lot more complex than rocks grinding together

[@crazyfakar1]

@@joratto2833 Questions about "rocks grinding together" can come from watching KZbin videos about more complex things.

[@guypeach1050]

How copying started is the questionI have often puzzled over.

[@user-mu3qc7zs8y]

Almost all serious scientists (Zenil, et al.) agree AT is not only fundamentally false (and intrinsically incapable of doing what their authors claim it to do) and a self-promotion overhype, but also weak plagiarism.

[@atomicinv2]

If I found an iphone on Mars, I would be surprised

[@user-jh2yn6zo3c]

More surprised: Steve Jobs dropped it there.

[@OtterFlys]

And he needed to find multiple iPhones in working order to be convinced they weren’t a natural phenomenon!

[@gsincs]

Lets dumb it down further. If you found a stone or metal plate with discernable etchings on it that clearly was a message of some kind. Would you say millions of years of wind and erosion did this? Or someone or something with intelligence did?

[@antoniussukardi9029]

​@@gsincsnormal thinking people would immediately recognized whether something is designed or not. But atheist like cronnin dawkins etc just played dumb

[@isatousarr7044]

The transition from matter to life is a fundamental question in biology and involves several key processes. It begins with the formation of simple molecules, such as amino acids and nucleotides, which are the building blocks of life. These molecules then combine to form more complex structures like proteins and nucleic acids. Through processes like self-assembly and replication, these structures eventually form protocells, which exhibit basic properties of living organisms, such as metabolism and reproduction. Over time, these protocells evolve into more complex life forms through natural selection and genetic variation. This process, known as abiogenesis, is a major focus of research in understanding how life originated on Earth.

[@changming912]

Basically he is not satisfied with "by chance", or "accidentally". Because "by chance" cannot account for lives to arise in quantity. There has to be a "law" of nature, make life's existence, is necessary and unavoidable.

[@Danoz_die_wreckt]

Life being older than rocks is such a trip

[@liberty-matrix]

"All life comes from a single moment of creation. Some 3.8 billion years ago in some bubbling mud pot or deep ocean thermal vent. Some little bag of chemicals twitched and became animate and than miraculously reproduced itself. Everything that lives now on earth, or ever has lived, descends from that moment. We are all built from a single original blueprint. I don't believe there is a more important or remarkable fact in the natural world, indeed in any world, then that one." ~Bill Bryson

[@ronaldmorgan7632]

Utter nonsense.

[@BFDT-4]

Now that "copying" and "existence" might also explain "perceptual control systems", and how that persistence or resistance to outward disturbances is also a signature of life. Check into the ideas of William T. Powers.

[@josemorgado356]

As a collector of proverbs for 50 years, I was compelled to understand how a proverb becomes a proverb., how it goes from being a nice and convincing sentence somebody pronounces once, to persist in time and become an oral expression of "universal" acceptance. So my final conlusion was that the individual who first pronounced the sentence does not give its life (existence) to the proverb but those who repeated (copying) it afterwards. Doesn't it sound like the life-creation process?

[@faster6329]

But, who designed life? THAT is the one thing we want to know. Even evolution is the result of that very first design.

[@janscott602]

Dream on. Protein machines are infinitely complex and any “evolution” destroys them. Life requires proteins and proteins cannot appear randomly. They must be manufactured. This guy is deluded.

[@user-lt4yd8kh7w]

The right conditions are what proteins need, we don't have those conditions now, we had them before

[@TheFrewah]

Evolution created machines that created precursors to protein. Then they got more advanced.

[@JohnA-bear]

If you have proteins, you still don't have life.

[@FirstLast-xj3xe]

I like it when people that haven't spent their whole life studying this stuff call a PhD's work bullshit. He gets funding for his ideas, you don't because you clearly haven't tried to understand it.

[@gregorynixon2945]

Your proposals still require a leap of magic. Could it be that, in a way we can't grasp, the universe itself is alive?

[@sbnwnc]

I am 100% an atheist. This makes no sense. God doesn't exist, and so there is a natural explanation of how we got from chemistry to biology. But that isn't provided here.

[@gsincs]

Nor is it provided by anyone in this field. You have to solve origin of life before we can even start to talk about evolution. Cronin keeps saying its "so simple" yet he nor multiple others in this field can make "life in the lab" or even come close.

[@user-zu2zo8ji4n]

@@sbnwnc In oder to be 100% atheistic and say that "there is a natural explanation", you would HAVE TO KNOW WHAT THAT EXPLANATION IS! So it is more accurate to say that you WANT there to be a natural explanation, wouldn't it?

[@sbnwnc]

@@user-zu2zo8ji4n What are you talking about?

[@sbnwnc]

@@user-zu2zo8ji4n There is now a natural explanation for lighting and thunder. Earlier in human history there was no natural explanation for these things. Now there is. What's the mystery here? Right now there is no natual explanation for how life emerged. There probably will be in the future.

[@sbnwnc]

@@gsincs Give it time.

[@apsalshereef]

1. Life is the emergent experience of others within the oneness of the universe. 2. Life is the will to STAY or survive. Reproduction and cloning are methods developed by life to STAY in the universe. And Points 1 and 2 are inseparable. That is life. P.S.: I really don't know why life wants to STAY. As far as I know, it's an emergent property, just like water emerges from hydrogen and oxygen.

[@martsangalang5781]

Molecules don't assemble themselves on their own to create something meaningful

[@jaimeapablaza8041]

How would you know? Were you there 4 billion years ago.

[@martsangalang5781]

@@jaimeapablaza8041 that's simple chemistry. Do you know chemistry?????? Hahahahaha please enlighten us 😂

[@martsangalang5781]

@@jaimeapablaza8041 I don't have to be there, I know chemistry 🤣. My advice? Stay in school and learn your chemistry 😆

[@jaimeapablaza8041]

@martsangalang5781 your arrogance and ignorance about what the earth was like 4 billion years ago shows me you don't know what you are talking about, whatever chemistry you know, it's not enough.

[@martsangalang5781]

@@jaimeapablaza8041 nope that's your ignorance

[@user-he7io2ht5o]

It's obviously incredibly condensed but I think the point still comes across if you pay attention. Through chemical processes of replication or multiplication originally inorganic in an stable enough environment, increasingly complex life forms start to develop.

[@lastchance8142]

Yes, that's the paradigm in a nutshell. But 75 years of concentrated research has not discovered anything like this to occur in the laboratory, or in nature. Hand-waving solves nothing.

[@potaxe8048]

It's impossible to deal with complexity (which is an informational concept) without matter. Every time you disappear matter, then you left information floating in the nothing. Information is secondary to the matter, its structure, its properties.

[@jessebryant9233]

And without information, you don't have life. And what kind of thing is required in order to generate novel information-complex, highly specialized, time specific, goal directed information?

[@theunspeakable24]

Persistence of existence is life and we are older than rocks. These are the 2 takeaways from this brief explanation. There are gaps or holes in the space between existence and persistence and rocks and life. Is there a field of holes that persists to exist beyond time and space???

[@idegteke]

In order to Exist (Stabilise) and Copy (Multiply) more and more complex entities, however, there MUST exist a fundamental “effect” that results in more complex things (molecules, monomers, polymers, proteins, cells, specialised cells, biological intelligence and even consciousness etc.) being more successful in existing and copying themselves, right? Otherwise things with lower Assembly Index (a category that I’m also happen to be using in my project without knowing its name) - that are necessarily more likely to come about - would overtake the entire universe unless something that makes being complex to be somehow an “evolutionary” advantage. And this would be my question to Mr. Lee Cronin that I will never have the chance to ask: - Why don’t you look for that “effect” that motivates matter-energy to produce the “emergence” in space-time, causing local increase in assembly index? Is that because you are convinced that such “effect” is not needed for complexity (and intelligence and consciousness) to arise? According to the theory (of everything) I’m currently practically using in my model, there must exist a fundamental “effect”, analogous with the so called gravitational force (that turned out to be “just” a curvature in space-time, rather than an actually force) and this could be called Assembling Gravitation that, unlike gravitation, brings/keeps things together NOT by their mass (and, potentially, even spatial distance) but their Assembly Index, therefore resulting in, creating, explaining the complexity that we can constantly experience even if we don’t want to. This Assembling Gravitation might be pictured like Schrödinger’s less advertised idea of quantum (or molecular) vitalism, and should be capable of explaining both evolution and the “chemical evolution” that must have happened before the existence of the first (assumed) stable and multiplicating cell.

[@gerardmengual1487]

Matter is used by life to structure itself but it doesn't create life, life is complex and has a purpose.

[@sonasol121121]

I swear this guy is really, really smart. Although he breaks his complete sequence of thought by saying there is information beneath the celular structures and this information, oh boy, no one can explain. Randomness doesn't go towards organization. Think about thermodynamics alone. Chemistry tends to go to stability, and life is the exact opposite of stability. Drop 1000 letters randomly and try to get a meaningful and concise text, I'll say in a lifetime you won't be able to.

[@galileog8945]

Yawn...the second law of thermodynamics. Can't you people read and realize this issue has been put to bed? Randomness CAN go and WANTS to go toward (local) organization. Look at how locally organized is our planet with respect to the Big Bang. Any doubt?

[@factchecker2090]

Existence has to exist for Life to happen - True Consuming, Processing, Copying, Multiplying - True But Why is the hard question?

[@antoniussukardi9029]

How is the question scientist has to ask. And this guy is not answering it here

[@somphopsirikham7720]

The original energy created everything even our soul ,so we'll never see it.

[@TheFrewah]

I think alien life is as common as fire and what I mean is that the triangle of fire tells us there will be fire 100% of the time when there’s enough fuel, oxidiser and heat. There’s a polygon of life as it were and we only know a few components. There must be ”stuff”, some source of energy, water and lots of time just to mention the obvious. The fact that we have a moon likely helped because it stirred the stuff. Life can’t form on planets close to really large stars since they last only a few million years.

[@BigJonesFL]

He gave a very good answer to a very complicated question in what is life. The definition of what is alive is something that keeps changing the more we discover. When you break down everything that seems complex, it’s usually the simplest answer that is correct. Just look at how we discovered the answers to evolution.

[@antoniussukardi9029]

I think that answer has been found way way before cronnin was even born

[@ronaldmorgan7632]

We haven't discovered the answers to evolution. All we have discovered is how natural selection works, and that process does not create new species.

[@jonahansen]

I didn't hear anything in the way of explanations here - only conclusory statements. Not quite Michael Levin, but striving...

[@FirstLast-xj3xe]

I feel like people miss the point of this video. It demonstrates that a possible explanation of life with a spontaneous and predictable model and puts it under scientific rigor.

[@gooddaysahead1]

Everything that we would call life is made of all the major elements in the universe. As the universe evolves, life forms out of random events. It's amazing. Life is made of hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, iron, carbon of course, etc. Everything that makes up life is found in the universe. The universe evolved in such a way that life occurred. It may stick around for a long time. It may not. It all depends on its adaptive ability. This isn't incredibly hard. It's just that our brains don't like randomness. We want patterns. And if we can't find patterns, we create them. When in fact, sheer randomness is at the heart and soul of why things exist and change over time.

[@user-fg3nu3ec4i]

Randomness you say... Then why so many scientists favoring determinism (which denies randomness) over free will? If one is true, then another is false. Either life is random and free will is true. Or it is not and everything is predetermined, life included.

[@observerone6727]

​@@user-fg3nu3ec4iNot correct. Everything can be causal and also be completely unpredictable (random).

[@weltschmerzistofthaufig2440]

​@@user-fg3nu3ec4i Determinism and randomness aren't mutually exclusive.

[@user-fg3nu3ec4i]

@@weltschmerzistofthaufig2440 how? How those 2 coexist at the same time. How can your claim that everything is predetermined but in the same time when something random happens it makes whole thing unpredictable untill you make a new calculation. Then everything is predetermined again. If something new and random won't happen again of course. In determinism everything must be predictable, correct? Cause and effect. Everything that was unpredicted must be due to lack of knowledge.

[@user-lt4yd8kh7w]

​@@user-fg3nu3ec4inot believing in free will doesn't make you a determinist

[@sapthan13]

Here my personal Dunning-Krueger featured thoughts about this topic: A lot of scientists would argue that life and evolution are a logical consequence of the second law of thermodynamics. Earth is not a closed system. You have to consider especially the sun with it's low entropy input and it's energy being radiated back from earth much less concentrated. Evolution is just maybe the process of developing a more efficient way for structures / organisms of spreading that concentrated energy along the way so that life actually even accelerates the conversion of low into high entropy. Think about how much longer it would take system earth to spread out the suns energy without life on it? Copying and existing is not an end to itself it is a comsequence if the second law of thermodynamics. Regarding complexity, I guess the states of highest and lowest entropy don't differ regarding complexity. It is the states between that feature complex but evolving structures.

[@MrGabrucho]

Well, Idk. If you think about It, life is actually saving energy that would otherwise disipate as heat.

[@stefan24georgiev]

the negentropy approach of explaining life has failed so far because it is too simple and doesn't take into account the changing context of each system. We need different approach, some combination of Viability Theory, Cybernetics, Information Theory, and Bioeconomics. And we seriously need to address the problem of meaning , which assembly theory and other approaches do not because they are rooted in Shannon's information theory. Shannon Information doesnt tell us anything about meaning. We need some kind of new semantic information theory that takes into account the context and gives the system its relevance. I like Verveake's approach to Relevance Realization but it is still too early to say.

[@sapthan13]

​@@stefan24georgievmeaning and relevance seems like a man made illusion to me. Also makes matters needlessly complicated.

[@sapthan13]

​@@MrGabruchothere is energy temporarily stored sure but life is very good at taking concentrated energy and "spreading it out"

[@stefan24georgiev]

@@sapthan13 we are just discovering that they are not man made illusions , but agent-arena relationships. You could say we don't have a science for them yet because they are found in chaos/complexity theory. In other words, not objective or subjective, but transjective.

[@Wondering_Nous]

What about life to matter? Biology to physics

[@hardikb15]

yeah well that happens when we die

[@arthurwieczorek4894]

Petrified wood.

[@felixkutta9636]

If you think about the laws of thermodynamics in an abstract way - specifically that entropy tends to a maximum - it seems almost as if life (which is increadibly good and using energy) is just a natural flow on effect of thermodynamics.

[@davidjellyman7006]

I wish he had explained his metric better. I can see how it explains complexity, but life isn't just complex, it is both organized and complex. How does his metric capture organized complexity.

[@brutallygwapo9597]

i was waiting for the punchline at the end. 'grinding' creates life.

[@hitscanner]

A possibility ~ A planet gives birth to its inhabitants. But the conditions have to be so perfect and conducive to “life” that it takes an incredible amount of luck and time to create. I’m also thinking of the Fermi paradox. Maybe we are the first life forms in the cosmos - or the last. Either way, each scenario has its burden of responsibility.

[@gabrielmauricio1475]

But the life on primordial earth create the conditions that we live today, the life create their only conditions to live

[@oaim50]

Life and consciousness are kind of in the same boat theoretically speaking. We don't know much of anything, but boy can we theorise! Both are continuities, aren't they? Or we speak of them because there is an empirically observable continuity worth speaking about.

[@parisivalingam8409]

The dichotomy of matter in the first place as animate and inanimate is itself wrong.Matter without motion is not seen in the nature.Everything is in motion.Life means motion. Basic tiny tiny matter particles in motion interact amongst themselves and because of their interaction,they create various kinds of new matter forms and motion pertaining to that forms.so everything is a living thíng.

[@thisissparta3965]

Not always intelligent life, but living 👍

[@annapurnaleo]

A persistent question in my life.how did I even come into the picture?

[@chiptowers1]

matter and inanimate matter has to be a correct value to form something of purpose according to a formulae. This may be random events but the reactions create their own iteration function for existence.

[@dimitardimitrakov2841]

Ok. Anything that replicates itself via natural chemical/physical process is life.

[@ruskinyruskiny1611]

"It is stranger than we can think" JBS Haldane. "Just be kind" Kurt Vonnegut.

[@charlesbrightman4237]

LIFE: The coherency of energy in a certain format. DEATH: The de-coherency of energy when life no longer exists. (And in a certain context, the entire universe is alive.)

[@shariqkhatri4657]

If your definition lands you at the whole universe is alive, it’s not a very good definition

[@hitscanner]

I like this notion to an extent. In fact it sparks to mind to me a reference by professor Brian Cox, where he stated something along the lines of “we as human beings are simply a complex organised arrangement of atoms”.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@charlesbrightman4237 watch the vocabulary. Saying something is alive is pretty loaded.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@shariqkhatri4657 No, I'm not saying it's alive. I'm just saying it evolves. Even geology evolves. Every single thing evolves. That doesn't mean it meets the criteria of life. Life is just one form of things that exist in the universe.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@hitscanner Yes. I think I heard that one.. I really like his way of thinking about things. I think he's amazing!.

[@Cuanalo]

It is a non answer. The fundamental marker of life is 'will' which translate in 'agency', doing something to pursue survival and avoid death and injury. Replication is not the key at all, many non-living systems may replicate but show no agency at all, they will replicate and grow until the resources run out or the conditions change; then they will do nothing at all to pursue further replication, they will also not 'do'' anything to avoid the end of the replication conditions. So, what one would have to explain is, how does non living material structures acquire 'will', what we call 'survival instinct'. Why is it that living beings 'want' to survive?

[@unclecode]

Ok so, life needs to replicate and thrive, so let's address the elephant in the room: "Is a virus alive?"

[@stefan24georgiev]

yes. The definition we choose for alive is exactly that. Usually when we say life usually we think of things that feel alive to us like animals and people. Things that we feel can have a conscious experience. But they could just be called more specifically conscious beings, or sentient beings. Viruses are alive because of their ability to persist through time, they have a certain self organizing viability

[@unclecode]

@@stefan24georgiev viruses lack of cellular structure, can’t reproduce independently and no metabolism of their own, how about these? It does seem a controversial topic.

[@crazyfakar1]

Are self-replicating robots alive? An inanimate object can "spring to life" when certain conditions are met, Like an alarm clock or a volcano.

[@stefan24georgiev]

@@unclecode You raise an important point since viruses cannot reproduce without a host they are not self sufficient . Its just a definition issue, a demarcation point for what you call life. Are Prions Life ? Are complex prebiotic molecules life? Its a spectrum it seems, we decide where to put the line that divides it, someplace that makes sense. It is still an ongoing debate .

[@Xzerbit]

ooo i see what u did there.. ;P

[@gooddaysahead1]

There are brilliant ideas out there that everything in the universe evolves. Not just things we might call life. But... everything

[@Michael0663-qo4wx]

Planets evolve

[@crazyfakar1]

...and, evolution is not just physical changes, it is behavioural changes too.

[@OperationBaboon]

no. "the process by which different kinds of living organism are believed to have developed from earlier forms during the history of the earth." the colloquial "the gradual development of something" applies, but has nothing to do with the theory or science of actual evolution.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@OperationBaboon lots and lots of established science would beg to differ with that statement.

[@OperationBaboon]

@@gooddaysahead1 name one, why and how. otherwise you made it up.

[@roddacanay1182]

"Selection" as a material mechanism has never been observed in nature or experimentally demonstrated to cause atoms and molecules to form into DNA / RNA (i.e. the prerequisites for "existence and copying" ).

[@ajeetlekha-p4v]

Clear and lucid expose. Rightly said by Professor Cronin, the meaning of it goes to say what existence is. Since, everything else apart from existence; atom dissected to gluons are explained by physical sciences; the expose finds its relevance in link-up with the well documented subject of Consciousness which is just another term for existence or life here.

[@sharad_1992]

I am expecting a longer video , it’s really interested

[@Philosia]

First video on my channel dated 11th April, 2019 IST gives a hypothesis that scientists can use. It is in Hindi but in about section the content is available in English also.

[@ginawhitmarsh2390]

So he recognized the quantification of complexity in information. Bravo, he rediscovered Shannon Theory. But life cannot be explained by it nor can life be sought after on other planets by solely seeking complexity. The complexity found in the assemblage and functioning of an iPhone is a special kind of discovery, that of "specific information". In other words, complexity can be found and quantified in any random arrangement of a set of characters, but random arrangement of alphabet characters in the form "Kilroy Was Here" is specific and would leave no doubt that intelligence is behind the creation of it, and more so would the working iPhone on Mars leave no doubt of its intelligent origin, more so the irreducibly complex protein machines found in every cell and the intricate coding and indexing system found in DNA that Richard Dawkins described as "uncannily like computer code". It's interesting that someone who finds "John Loves Mary" scratched in the sand and thinks it to be some weird affect of the tide would be considered an idiot, but all of the scientists trying to find a naturalistic progression leading to life are held up as the intellectuals of our culture.

[@richardbryan6349]

Thank you 👏👏

[@bn8682]

7 minutes I can never get back

[@BJtheMountaineerguy]

If I saw an iPhone on mars I would believe that it was designed by someone, same thing goes for life. When I see life I know it was designed by someone much bigger, better and smarter than myself. It’s so obvious

[@wberckmann]

God created man; man created I-phone. How's that for simplicity?

[@ridelo]

Interesting, but can we deduce from this idea how it really could have happened? I suppose that there were gazillions of events that produced entities that existed and copied, but failed until one managed to stay 'alive' and the game was on.

[@AmitRay47]

If you have made a living cell in the lab by combining different elements, like Carbon, Oxygen, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, etc, you could have answered the question.

[@genx316]

5:17 "...Yeah, rocks to dinosaurs is one, yep. 5:22 Assembly Theory challenges the notion 5:24 that life is vastly impossible, 5:27 because Assembly Theory explains how rocks, 5:31 step-by-step, by grinding together, undergo selection, 5:35 and produce complexity, step-by-step-by-step..." This is just fairytales.

[@moazzemchowdhury6014]

life controls matter and energy, but it is neither matter not energy, so totally different thing

[@claudepariseau7356]

This man is so full of hot air , as if life could just self-organise . Even the primitive proto-cell is so intricate that there are no chemical-physical forces that could produce such a level of complexity , and certainly not chance . Read any book by David Abel to grasp what's needed for life to exist .

[@danielpaulson8838]

Supernatural are explanations for non thinkers. What do YOU have to say? My authority is knowledge, not one man that I agree with. Wrong classroom. This is for open minds.

[@claudepariseau7356]

@@danielpaulson8838 , well i could say your mind is closed to the obvious supernatural causes . I have experienced the paranormal on a few occasions , and this opened my mind to something outside the material . I was a militant atheist before these events . And anyways , there are no physical or chemical explanations and possibilities for a naturalistic explanation for the complexity of even the genome of a protocell , and it's probabilistically impossible , + there are countless other problems with abiogenesis . No hard feelings .

[@user-lt4yd8kh7w]

You dont understand emergence at all do you

[@karenfry5538]

I likes your existence idea. For me Life is a series of chemical reactions that self perpetuate.

[@DavidGS66]

Nonliving chemicals do the same thing as life; however, life has been self-sustaining for 4.2 Billion years & an important part of being self-sustaining is life has an incumbent's advantage, so no other Genesis can become self-sustaining ever again.

[@observerone6727]

Molecular self-assembly started life on earth, with 1) ingredients, 2) conditions, 3) massive parallelism, 4) deep time, and 5) mutation and adaptation (and only what works survives). Physics, Chemistry, and Biology, in that order. Now a bunch of us languaged primates wonder "What the hell happened ?". Good thing we have enough 'puzzle pieces' collected now to see the picture.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@observerone6727 You are sort of getting it. It but molecules don't self-assemble per se. They assembled by randomness. This process is achingly slow. There is no design. There is no destiny or purpose. It appears you're not a troll so I need to share this with you. This is how things come to exist... kzbin.info/www/bejne/nIGWeWprlL2aZ5osi=U4tuJytFEydMZ8AV

[@user-hf3ql7qm1o]

Metal/ceramic oxides or (large) biomolecules? The former can last near forever...proteins, enzymes,nucleic acids...very much NO.

[@Vital_form]

I still haven't seen a good explanation of the link between molecules and living, self replicating cells.

[@gooddaysahead1]

@@Vital_form kzbin.info/www/bejne/eZykgZuQZ7aAnZYsi=LK294VOIXPhahj6x

[@observerone6727]

​@@Vital_formYou never will, even though your living body right now is continuously using lifeless moving atoms and bonded atoms (a.k.a. molecules). Life is motion, combining and dividing, of lifeless chemical 'LEGO blocks'.

[@raymcconnell3839]

Copying + Existence + TIME (lots of it) => complexity + selection = life

[@The-Well]

Superb explanation!

[@arthurwieczorek4894]

In the broadest generality, the bridge between physics and biology is a law of conservation of structure. The structure I am referring to is DNA which, form three different perspectives, is chemical structure, functional mechanism and information, all at the same time.

[@MichaeldeSousaCruz]

Life seems to be a regenerative emergent constraint. He hasn’t come across that? 🤷‍♂️

[@Adaerus]

In order to understand how this video provides an answer is to let go of materialism and allow for non-material things to exist such as processes and relationality. Matter itself is a result of process and relationality. Once that understanding is clarified then the video has provided the answer: persistance of existance, which is in itself not a material thing. An organism is the material expression of processing and relationaity of elements from which is formed which tend to persist in existing.

[@dreamer71081]

Well one thing for sure. The Answer does not Exist. But I persist to believe that complex life must be the result of Complex intentional design.

[@amitkumarbhardwaj4321]

Just understood that this man knows something that I am not able to understand

[@NormenHansen]

Its Wolfram's Ruliad. It exists and keeps itself alive by copying the examples of its rules.

[@nickfreygang80]

what a good insight. Has wolfram weighed in on Assembly theory?

[@NormenHansen]

I don‘t think so. But his Theory might supply the more formal framework people seem to miss with Cronins work 🤷‍♂️

[@fredlar9421]

We don't know what life is, and we will never.

[@commanderthorkilj.amundsen3426]

One can have a PhD and still lack DEEP understanding, still use terms like Evolution incorrectly, still not realize the mathematical impossibility of self-assembly, the problem of oxygen and the presence of water as impediments to spontaneous formation of building block bio-molecules, the thermodynamic, entropic, and enantiomeric impediments, the absolute requirement for specific ordering of nitrogenous bases, the need for code, a plan, engineering, and on and on. His research has failed, his theory is not new, despite the barely-controlled excitement over somewhat new terminology he’s employing. Meh……

[@lastchance8142]

Indeed, thank you! Unfortunately, the vast majority of those reading your post have no idea whatsoever of its import.

[@suruxstrawde8322]

All matter is inanimate, life is more than the sum of its parts. It's a process, not a material.

[@ronaldmorgan7632]

Bingo.

[@DWKThedogbreaths]

If this is what interests NASA and is being studied at Glasgow University we are in a bad way. Chemistry is one of the greatest enterprises of human evolution, see it reduced to waffle and smug simplicity makes me very sad.

[@prototropo]

Animation? Dynamism? Transpiration? Transformation? Propulsion? Interaction? Experience? Metabolism? Desire? Sensation? Synergy? Motility? Emergent novelty? Directed generativity? I don't see a need to minimize, or reduce life to some singular plausibility. I'm not sure we even need a definition for "life," as opposed to "alive," which definitely calls for one. But if we do try to define life, we cannot possibly ignore all the above aspects of living beings.

[@Xzerbit]

I dont think of it as minimized, more of simplified for easier understanding for the masses.. 🤔😊

[@albertcheeni]

Is life simply another 'property' of matter? That is---given the right circumstances and right ingredients--- life becomes inevitable. If that is so then, the Universe must be teeming with all sorts of exotic life forms -----carbon based (like on earth)-- silicon based copper based etc. etc.

[@charlesbrightman4237]

IN THE INTEREST OF FINDING THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING: SOME THINGS MODERN SCIENCE DOES NOT APPARENTLY KNOW: Consider the following: a. Numbers: Modern science does not even know how numbers and certain mathematical constants exist for math to do what math does. Surely the very nature of reality has to allow numbers and mathematical constants to actually exist for math to do what math does in this existence. (And nobody as of yet has been able to show me how numbers and certain mathematical constants can come from the Standard Model Of Particle Physics). b. Space: Modern science does not even know what 'space' actually is nor how it could actually warp and expand. c. Time: Modern science does not even know what 'time' actually is nor how it could actually warp and vary. d. Gravity: Modern science does not even know what 'gravity' actually is nor how gravity actually does what it appears to do. And for those who claim that 'gravity' is matter warping the fabric of spacetime, see 'b' and 'c' above. e. Speed of Light: 'Speed', distance divided by time, distance being two points in space with space between those two points. But yet, here again, modern science does not even know what space and time actually are that makes up 'speed' and they also claim that space can warp and expand and time can warp and vary, so how could they truly know even what the speed of light actually is that they utilize in many of the formulas? Speed of light should also warp, expand and vary depending upon what space and time it was in. And if the speed of light can warp, expand and vary in space and time, how then do far away astronomical observations actually work that are based upon light and the speed of light that could warp, expand and vary in actual reality? f. Photons: A photon swirls with the 'e' and 'm' energy fields 90 degrees to each other. A photon is also considered massless. What keeps the 'e' and 'm' energy fields together across the vast universe for billions of light years? And why doesn't the momentum of the 'e' and 'm' energy fields as they swirl about not fling them away from the central area of the photon? And why aren't photons that go across the vast universe torn apart by other photons, including photons with the exact same energy frequency, and/or by matter, matter being made up of quarks, electrons and interacting energy, quarks and electrons being considered charged particles, each with their respective magnetic field with them? Electricity is electricity and magnetism is magnetism varying possibly only in energy modality, energy density and energy frequency. So why doesn't the 'e' and 'm' of other photons and of matter basically tear apart a photon going across the vast universe? Also, 'if' a photon actually red shifts, where does the red shifted energy go and why does the photon red shift? And for those who claim space expanding causes a photon to red shift, see 'b' above. Why does radio 'em' (large 'em' waves) have low energy and gamma 'em' (small 'em' waves) have high energy? And for those who say E = hf; see also 'b' and 'c' above. (f = frequency, cycles per second. But modern science claims space can warp and expand and time can warp and vary. If 'space' warps and expands and/or 'time' warps and varies, what does that do to 'E'? And why doesn't 'E' keep space from expanding and time from varying?). g. Energy: Modern science claims that energy cannot be created nor destroyed, it's one of the foundations of physics. Hence, energy is either truly a finite amount and eternally existent, or modern science is wrong. First Law Of Thermodynamics: "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed." How exactly is 'energy' eternally existent? h. Existence and Non-Existence side by side throughout all of eternity. How? * ADDED NOTE: My current TOE idea can potentially answer all of these above items, and more, in a logical, coherent and inter-related manner. And wouldn't one expect the true TOE of existence itself to be able to do that? What other TOE idea in known existence can currently do that? Surely not the General or Special Relativity Models nor even the Standard Model of Particle Physics. TOE IDEA: (Short version): [currently dependent upon the results of my gravity test]: The 'gem' photon is the eternally existent energy unit of this universe. The strong and weak nuclear forces are derivatives of the electromagnetic ('em') interactions between quarks and electrons. The nucleus is a magnetic field boundary. 'Gravity' is a part of electromagnetic radiation, gravity acting 90 degrees to the 'em' modalities, which of course act 90 degrees to each other. 'Gravity' is not matter warping the fabric of spacetime, 'gravity' is a part of spacetime that helps to make up matter. The gravity and 'em' modalities of matter interact with the gravity and 'em' modalities of spacetime and the gravity and 'em' modalities of spacetime interact with the gravity and 'em' modalities of matter. I am open to any and all theory of everything ideas that can potentially answer all those above items in a logical, coherent and inter-related manner. Currently, as far as I am currently aware of, there are no others but my own. GRAVITY TEST: (Short Version): Direct a high powered laser 90 degrees through an electric field and magnetic field polarized as such to nullify the 'em' of the laser. "IF" my current TOE idea is correct, a gravitational black hole would become evident. (The 'gem' photon being the energy unit of this universe that makes up everything else in existence in this existence.)

[@flor.7797]

1x1=2

[@munnabhaimbbf123]

😂

[@sidxharth]

🤔

[@Makes_me_wonder]

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_problems_in_physics

[@Catroll111]

For g. That's metaphysics, *not* physics, and you assume a state of non existence is the default

[@veralucialucia3639]

Very interesting how scientists Robert Lanze and Nancy Kress approach the topic of life in the universe in their book Biocentrism.

[@jessebryant9233]

But what is assumed without question? That evolution in the abiogenesis and Darwinian sense of common ancestry is a fact-even though we can't prove it is even possible.

[@tedkrasicki3857]

Search the Nick Lane vids This one is good--- Nick Lane: The electrical origins of life

[@jessebryant9233]

@@tedkrasicki3857 So... More story telling that has nothing to do with empirical science? Genius!

[@RealityJerk]

There are other aspects to my existence than just existing and copying. Like for example this right here, what I'm doing now.

[@ronaldmorgan7632]

Yes. Even if all of your cells had momentarily stopped dividing, your collection of cells made the decision to watch the video.

[@RealityJerk]

@@ronaldmorgan7632 Emergent qualities are just as real as what caused them.

[@anikettripathi7991]

according to sanatan life is a software that arranges and makes own hardware/body. in simple body is material/hardware,soul is software. Union of both is life both can't remain independently.

[@thomasgill223]

I disagree with his summation of life as copying and existing. First, diamonds are going to exist billions of years, perhaps longer than any earth life, and certainly atoms themselves exist for theoretically trillions of years. Things besides life "exist" and may continue to exist longer than life itself, so there's that. Reproduction (copying) and evolution are, I think, the very quintessence of life.

[@NeonVisual]

Biology and sustained self replication is what happens when physics and chemistry are left to stew for billions of years with an energy source. Evolution happens when a part of the self replication is damaged, and the damage provides an advantage, with any damage providing a disadvantage being rapidly junked through natural selection favouring the best use of available energy to self replicate and propagate. It's not just survival of the fittest, it's survival of the most energy efficient.