Defining `Life'

Details Defining `Life' Defining `Life'

Aug 2002

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002oleb...32..387c&link_type=abstract

Origins of Life and Evolution of the Biosphere, v. 32, Issue 4, p. 387-393 (2002).

Biology

20

Definition Of Life, Astrobiology, Viking, Europa, Natural Kinds

Scientific paper

There is no broadly accepted definition of `life.' Suggested definitions face problems, often in the form of robust counter-examples. Here we use insights from philosophical investigations into language to argue that defining `life' currently poses a dilemma analogous to that faced by those hoping to define `water' before the existence of molecular theory. In the absence of an analogous theory of the nature of living systems, interminable controversy over the definition of life is inescapable.

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