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GRAVE PROBLEM. “It is relatively easy to show that complete bottom-up reconstructions from the level of molecules to the level of whole organs would require much more computing power than we are ever likely to have available.” http://rsfs.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/2/1/55 View in LinkedIn

PARTICLES ARE CONTEXTUAL. “Biological reductionists whose motivation is that of reducing biology to physics need to be aware that physics itself also displays the kind of limits I am describing here. Nor are these limits restricted to particle theory.” http://rsfs.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/2/1/55 View in LinkedIn

DEATH AND GENERATION OF COMPLEXITY. "Programmed cell death plays a central role in development, participating in particular in morphogenesis (the sculpting of the form of embryos), in sexual differentiation, and in the epigenetic self-organization processes that allow the emergence of the two most complex regulatory organs of our body, the immune system and the nervous system." http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn

"CELL SUICIDE plays an essential role in the maintenance of the genetic identity and the integrity of the body, by inducing the rapid elimination of altered cells." http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn

INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL DEATH PROMPTS. "At another level, each individual cell may be considered as a complex entity, a 'society' by itself, a mingling of heterogeneous organelles and components that behaves as a whole. And self-destruction can occur not only as a response to signals originating from the outside environment of the cell, but also from its inside environment." http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn

SOCIAL CONNECTIVITY AND DEATH. "But the permanent coupling of each cell fate to the nature of the interactions it can establish with the collectivity to which it belongs, represents only one dimension of the 'social control' of cell survival and cell death." http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn

ADAPTIVE PLASTICITY OF SOMA. "This very frailty, this permanent reprieve and the interdependence they generate between our cells, are one of the bases of our perennity and our plasticity, allowing our bodies to build themselves, to constantly reconstruct, and to adapt to ever changing environments." http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn

SO ENDS this reflection of Denis Nobel’s provocative thinking that rocks the boat of the central dogma of molecular biology and Neo-Darwinism. It is the nature of Khunian scientific revolutions that knowledge itself continues to evolve, often through a series of upheavals and periods of extreme resistance to new ideas. But in the end, per the adage, we see further because we stand on the shoulders of giants. View in LinkedIn

TWO WAY CAUSATION IS REAL. “The question is not whether downward causation of the kind discussed in this article exists, it is rather how best to incorporate it into biological theory and experimentation.” http://rsfs.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/2/1/55 View in LinkedIn

CLUMSY TOOLS. “While I think we can be certain that multi-level causation with feedbacks between all the levels is an important feature of biological organisms, the tools we have to deal with such causation need further development.” http://rsfs.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/2/1/55 View in LinkedIn