Every theory of evolution is a theory of engineering. You can test any scientific theory by applying it to technology.
The central question in biology: “What does a cell know about itself?” Life directs its own evolution.
Three levels of causation: Chemicals (universal laws of physics), codes (local rules of language & logic), and consciousness (agency). Consciousness encodes information which controls chemistry.
Living things are conscious agents: A cell is not merely a machine, it is a self with the capacity to act.
Evolution harnesses identical principles across different domains such as technology, business, music, culture, and yes, biology.
Evolution is not random events. It’s response to random events.
Codes are evidence of free will.
Life is more resourceful, tenacious, and focused than it “should” be in a purely mechanical universe.
Science explores an orderly, mathematical, elegant, and beautiful world that is a window into the mind of an architect.
A solution to the Evolution 2.0 Prize will be as revolutionary as the discovery of the genetic code or the splitting of the atom. Bigger than Google, bigger than ChatGPT.
Charles Munford hosts a lively discussion every month called “Agential Topics.” I was a guest and the group had a wide ranging enjoyable conversation. My paper “Biology Transcends the Limits of Computation” is the manifesto behind the Evolution 2.0 Prize. In this presentation I explain my wider thinking behind the paper as well as my personal journey that led me here.
I explain how science has gotten cause and effect backwards – it’s not chemicals -> codes -> cognition, it’s cognition -> code -> chemicals; and if we are ever going to solve the information problem (or cancer, or viruses, or origin of life, or generate REAL AI) we are going to have to start with cognition and consciousness, which I believe are fundamental.
The extensive Q&A explores many adjacent topics: Read more »
Two of my favorite scientists, Michael Levin and Azra Raza with Aastha Jain Simes, put their heads together in this provocative and touching interview. Azra describes the technology of our new company PredictRX that detects cancer at Stage Negative One.
We do this with a “Stentinel,” (starts at 15 minutes in) a stent with electronic sensors that is implanted in the arm and sense Polyploid Giant Cancer Cells (PGCCs) within 18 days of appearing in a patient. Read more »
Wigner marveled at how perfectly mathematics describes physical reality. Newton’s laws, quantum electrodynamics, relativity – all use elegant mathematical formulas that predict physical behavior with extraordinary precision.
The fact that abstract math, developed in the minds of humans, so perfectly describes the physical universe is, as Wigner put it, “a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve.”
Many times in physics, solutions dreamed up by mathematicians decades or centuries before suddenly show themselves to be precisely applicable.
Everyone in science accepts this, to the point where many define science itself as the imperative to reduce everything in the cosmos to equations.
A colleague sent me an email titled “Science has more bs than marketing, it seems” with a link to an X post that says:
In one famous 2012 paper that attempted to reproduce 53 “landmark” studies in cancer biology: Only 6 papers’ findings could be successfully replicated, or just 11% of the top papers in the field. 89% of the top papers were not independently reproducible.
I replied:
Yes.
I’ve always felt scientists are more prone to drink their own pink koolaid than marketers. Probably because marketers know they’re marketing and scientists assume they’re dealing with fundamental truths. When in fact most of what most people think of as “science” is really marketing.
Chemist Steve Benner once said to me that you are either doing science = disproving a hypothesis, OR advocacy = advancing your hypothesis = marketing.
100%. All scientific papers are marketing documents, which hopefully follow a rigorous set of rules for presenting evidence (BTW bona fide proof of most things is impossible, the closest you can get is mathematical proofs) and narrow strictures on style.
You’re allowed to be evasive and emotionally manipulative in science papers, as long as you say it in passive voice. E.g. “It was observed that…. it was concluded that….”
That allows you to say almost anything you want without acknowledging that someone had a point of view and a subjective opinion. It allows you to obscure cause and effect, not name the person offering the opinion, and sound more authoritative than you really are.
(Also, as any English teacher or magazine editor will tell you, passive voice is terrible writing.)
But there’s a much deeper problem: biology has agency and therefore by definition is not deterministic or repeatable like algorithms; and furthermore, biology is driven by quantum effects, so in biology (and perhaps physics as well – I’m not certain) the experiment is entangled with the beliefs and expectations of the experimenter.
People SORT OF know this (e.g. requirements of placebo tests in clinical trials). But on other levels, many are still in denial.
I have a hunch placebo effect not only applies to our internal experiences of taking medications etc, but also to our interactions with external events, people and organisms. Your beliefs literally affect the outcome of your external experiment. The extent to which this is true is unknown.
She’s 86 yet she looks like she’s in her 60s. After 35 years of Myelodysplastic Syndrome she is still beating the odds every day.
In our conversation, she explains her radical outlook and her success under the watchful eye of oncologist Dr. Azra Raza at Columbia University in New York City.
To learn more about Azra’s work, visit www.reversingcancer.org or contact John Correll [email protected].
Richard Dawkins authored the world’s #1 best-selling science book “The Selfish Gene” in 1976.
Dawkins’ PhD examiner at Oxford was Dr. Denis Noble, who is a longtime friend of Evolution 2.0.
Justin Brierley hosted a 3-way conversation where Denis explains how the Selfish Gene has vandalized science and cancer research for 50 years – and how the tide is rapidly turning:
Just wrapped a mind-bending podcast with John and David Fox.
A single teaspoon of bacteria is more sophisticated than an entire building of Google engineers. Not even close. We’re talking 100,000x more complex than anything Silicon Valley has ever produced. This ties directly into what my team discovered about cancer. Everyone thinks it’s just “bad genes.” Wrong. It’s actually your body’s own evolutionary toolkit turning against you. Read more »
Michael was an agnostic / atheist who cheerfully and generously engaged opposing views. Many of his peers on the irreligious side of the fence were hostile and abrasive, but Michael exhibited unwavering respect, always insisting on assuming his opponents operate with positive intent. Read more »
This incisive list of questions must be answered before any two people can have a meaningful conversation about the nature of intelligence and AI (because each of us has our own personal definitions & sacred cows about being and beings). From a paper by Nicolas Rouleau and Michael Levin:
Alexey Tolchinsky { It could be that we understand Michael differently, or interpret differently. Because of that, I'll be specific. Here is one ... }
Alexey Tolchinsky { My reading of Michael Levin's work is different from him "demolishing conventional notions of intelligence." First, it is useful to ... }
Josh S { You can read his book The Master Builder: How the New Science of the Cell Is Rewriting the Story of ... }
martin rag { Perry, I don't know where to post this one -- but I came across this article, I know that you ... }
martin rag { "You don’t even understand why the viruses form polyphyletic clades." Is it correct, that viruses have many evolutionary origins unlike ... }
R Khan { You don't even understand why the viruses form polyphyletic clades. }
Amal Mohan { Hi Perry, I've read that Dennis Noble doesn't believe in genetic "codes" or any other programs/codes/ blueprints... could you please clarify ... }
Josh S { Perry, have you noticed how the neo-Darwinists are claiming that the evolutionary mechanisms discussed in your book (horizontal gene transfer, ... }
Pete Holzmann { Perry, This is quite interesting. Sarah Salviander (astrophysicist ) has her own quite detailed comparison of Genesis 1 and the science... ... }
Michael was an agnostic / atheist who cheerfully and generously engaged opposing views. Many of his peers on the irreligious side of the fence were hostile and abrasive, but Michael exhibited unwavering respect, always insisting on assuming his opponents operate with positive intent. 
