Protocells

In 2007 two researchers, chemist Martin Hanczyc and artificial life scientist Takashi Ikegami, who were collaborating across disciplines agreed to test a hypothesis about the earliest forms of life (Hanczyc et al. 2007). They hypothesized that life’s precursors would need to move around their environment to take advantage of a resource-rich situation on early Earth. Hanczyc made a model system to test this hypothesis using an oil droplet that he bestowed with an internal chemical reaction, or...

 The Strong Anthropic Principle

The weak anthropic principle is not very controversial. But there is a stronger form that we will argue for here, although it is regarded with disdain among some physicists. The strong anthropic principle suggests that the fact that we exist imposes constraints not just on our environment but on the possible form and content of the laws of nature themselves. The idea arose because it is not only the peculiar characteristics of our solar system that seem oddly conducive to the development of h...