meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
Sean Carroll's Mindscape: Science, Society, Philosophy, Culture, Arts, and Ideas

266 | Christoph Adami on How Information Makes Sense of Biology

Sean Carroll's Mindscape: Science, Society, Philosophy, Culture, Arts, and Ideas

Sean Carroll | Wondery

Society & Culture, Physics, Philosophy, Science, Ideas, Society

4.84.4K Ratings

🗓️ 19 February 2024

⏱️ 81 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Evolution is sometimes described -- not precisely, but with some justification -- as being about the "survival of the fittest." But that idea doesn't work unless there is some way for one generation to pass down information about how best to survive. We now know that such information is passed down in a variety of ways: through our inherited genome, through epigenetic factors, and of course through cultural transmission. Chris Adami suggests that we update Dobzhansky's maxim "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution" to "... except in the light of information." We talk about information theory as a subject in its own right, and how it helps us to understand organisms, evolution, and the origin of life.

Blog post with transcript: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2024/02/19/266-christoph-adami-on-how-information-makes-sense-of-biology/

Support Mindscape on Patreon.

Christoph Adami received his Ph.D. in physics from Stony Brook University. He is currently professor of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics as well as Physics and Astronomy at Michigan State University. Among his awards are the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Artificial Life. His new book is The Evolution of Biological Information: How Evolution Creates Complexity, from Viruses to Brains.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

How do I tell them? How do I tell them? How do I pay the bills? How do I pay the bills?

0:07.0

I know what goes through your head when you're living with cancer. The questions, the fears, the need to know.

0:14.0

How do I know?

0:16.0

Because I'm living with cancer too.

0:19.0

That's why I joined the McMillan online community,

0:22.0

and we can help people like you,

0:24.5

whatever you need to ask.

0:26.6

To join us, search Macmillan Online Community.

0:30.6

Hello everyone, welcome to the Mindscape podcast I'm your host Sean Carroll

0:33.8

longtime listeners will know that I've long been a fan of Las Vegas like to go to

0:39.7

Vegas play poker eat shop whatever just relax and have a good time, haven't been able to do it quite as much.

0:46.4

Now that we're on the East Coast, that's okay.

0:48.8

There's always pluses and minuses.

0:50.0

Now we can go to New York.

0:51.4

It's like the Las Vegas of the East. But anyway, one of the reasons why I like Las Vegas is in addition

0:56.7

to the stereotype. So the stereotypes are absolutely there, right? There are long rows of slot machines with dull-eyed people mindlessly pressing buttons hoping to get rich someday.

1:10.0

It's kind of depressing that part. But there's a lot of weird stuff in Vegas if you

1:14.1

look closely enough so by Vegas standards one of the weird things that I really

1:19.1

like is there's an outpost of Bauman Rare Books.

1:23.2

This is a well-known Rare Bookstore

1:25.3

with headquarters in New York,

1:27.4

but they have a Vegas store in the Palazzo Hotel Casino, where I to stay sometimes and it's just weird among all the glitz and glamor here's rare books and they actually have a lot of first editions of things but also some weird science e-books.

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Sean Carroll | Wondery, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Sean Carroll | Wondery and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.