Bur God gives an answer: God Himself that formed the earth and made it; He hath established it, He created it not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else. Isaiah 45:18
"For centuries, we’ve asked the same impossible question: What is life—and what gives it meaning? Now, scientists think they’re closer than ever to answering it. But their explanation isn’t philosophical or spiritual—it’s something far more concrete, hidden deep within the structure of matter itself.
A growing number of scientists began asking: what if life isn’t about what it does—but how it’s built? Maybe the secret to life lies in the steps it takes to construct itself, not the ingredients it uses.
That question led Dr. Sara Imari Walker of Arizona State University and Prof. Lee Cronin of the University of Glasgow to develop a bold new framework. They called it Assembly Theory—and it just might rewrite how we define life.
The result was a theory that measures life by its construction history.
At its core, Assembly Theory looks at how difficult it is to build a molecule from scratch. The more unique steps needed, the higher its “assembly index.” Molecules from living systems usually require far more steps—meaning they carry a kind of chemical memory.
The Assembly Index counts the minimum number of building steps needed to make a molecule. The higher the number, the less likely it could form randomly. That threshold becomes a measurable signal of life—or something life-like—at work.
Assembly Theory tracks how much “history” a molecule carries. It’s not just what a molecule is—it’s how much effort the universe had to invest to make it.
Under this view, meaning isn’t mystical—it’s measurable. Life is what happens when matter begins to record its own construction through increasing complexity. Meaning is literally embedded in the way life builds itself."
JesseSinger/msn
"For centuries, we’ve asked the same impossible question: What is life—and what gives it meaning? Now, scientists think they’re closer than ever to answering it. But their explanation isn’t philosophical or spiritual—it’s something far more concrete, hidden deep within the structure of matter itself.
That question led Dr. Sara Imari Walker of Arizona State University and Prof. Lee Cronin of the University of Glasgow to develop a bold new framework. They called it Assembly Theory—and it just might rewrite how we define life.
The result was a theory that measures life by its construction history.
At its core, Assembly Theory looks at how difficult it is to build a molecule from scratch. The more unique steps needed, the higher its “assembly index.” Molecules from living systems usually require far more steps—meaning they carry a kind of chemical memory.
The Assembly Index counts the minimum number of building steps needed to make a molecule. The higher the number, the less likely it could form randomly. That threshold becomes a measurable signal of life—or something life-like—at work.
Assembly Theory tracks how much “history” a molecule carries. It’s not just what a molecule is—it’s how much effort the universe had to invest to make it.
Under this view, meaning isn’t mystical—it’s measurable. Life is what happens when matter begins to record its own construction through increasing complexity. Meaning is literally embedded in the way life builds itself."
JesseSinger/msn