Scale-Free Biology: Integrating Evolutionary and Developmental Thinking.
Bioessays
; 42(8): e1900228, 2020 08.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-32537770
ABSTRACT
When the history of life on earth is viewed as a history of cell division, all of life becomes a single cell lineage. The growth and differentiation of this lineage in reciprocal interaction with its environment can be viewed as a developmental process; hence the evolution of life on earth can also be seen as the development of life on earth. Here, in reviewing this field, some potentially fruitful research directions suggested by this change in perspective are highlighted. Variation and selection become, for example, bidirectional information flows between scales, while the notions of "cooperation" and "competition" become scale relative. The language of communication, inference, and information processing becomes more useful than the language of causation to describe the interactions of both homogeneous and heterogeneous living systems at any scale. Emerging scale-free theoretical frameworks such as predictive coding and active inference provide conceptual tools for reconceptualizing biology as the study of a unified, multiscale dynamical system.
Palavras-chave
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Biologia do Desenvolvimento
/
Evolução Biológica
Tipo de estudo:
Prognostic_studies
Limite:
Humans
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Bioessays
Ano de publicação:
2020
Tipo de documento:
Article