Product Description
by Rafael Ball (Author)
Microorganisms, viruses, and computer programs encode all the information necessary to reproduce and spread themselves. Yet these mechanisms are amazingly similar in the animate world, in the world of viruses, and even in the world of technical systems. The book shows how great the parallels are between these various animate and inanimate replicating systems and what they are based on.
The excursion also leads into the fascinating world of genetics, to the question of what defines life and into the programming of software that multiplies itself independently. Finally, the question is derived whether and to what extent such self-replicating technical systems can become as dangerous as infectious viruses in triggering pandemics, such as the Corona pandemic in 2020.
Back Jacket
Microorganisms, viruses and computer programmes encode all the information they need to reproduce and spread themselves. The mechanisms in the living world, in viruses and even in the world of technical systems are amazingly similar. The book shows how great the parallels of these replication systems are and what they are based on.
The excursus also leads into the fascinating world of genetics, to the question of what constitutes life, and to software that replicates itself independently.
Content:
- What is life?
- Basic concepts of molecular genetics
- Viruses and early genetics
- Algorithms and self-replicating computer programs
- What is information?
- Coding of information in technology and biology
- Coevolution of life and technology
The author
Rafael Ball holds a PHD in biology, is a historian of science and a librarian. He is director of the ETH Library Zurich and lecturer in library science and management. He works on questions of information theory, scholarly communication and the effects of digitisation He is the author of numerous relevant publications, editor of information science journals and speaker at meetings and conferences.
Author Biography
The author Rafael Ball holds a PhD in biology, is a historian of science and a librarian. He is director of the ETH-Bibliothek Zurich and lecturer in library science and management at the University of Applied Sciences Graubünden. For many years he has been concerned with questions of information theory, science communication and the effects of digitisation on science and society in the present and the future. He is the author of numerous relevant publications, editor of information science journals and speaker at meetings and conferences.
