Saturday 15 August 2020

Summary: 'What is Life' by Schrodinger

Ch1: The classical Physicist's Approach to the subject

Why are organisms so large as compared to atoms?

Because of emergence of laws from the background heat as a result of large number of atoms. For example, motion of  each molecule in a gas is random, but diffusion emerges as an approximate law due to the principle of large numbers. Author points out that even if we know the number density of a gas, given a volume that should have N molecules, the actual number fluctuates by an amount $\sqrt{N}$.

Author suggests that all that we know about physics is approximate in this sense, as the pattern emerges out of large number of atoms that we have access to.

Author notes how because of the background heat, if life was susceptible to influence from individual atomic interactions, we would not be capable of organised thought.

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