Michael Levin

Well, well, no, because the information that keeps it alive is still under question.

And actually, are you familiar with Michael Levin's work?

No.

So Michael Levin is a biologist who's literally revolutionizing biology right now, and he targeted this question because it was like, you know, evolutionary biologists would insist, just like you said, that everything you just said, if we can figure out that sequence, it's all solved.

'Cause, like, you don't need a, an explanation beyond that because the second you have self, uh, the second you have replicators that are surviving in an environment, they kind of continue the process.

Well, no, there's, like, literally a s- a, a, something that sustains the process.

That's not enough.

Uh, even a chemical, uh, catalyst w- are not enough to tell the story.

It's just, there's so much more to it and it's getting really exciting.

A lot of this, of course, transgresses from my interest in Michael Levin's research.

And so I've been learning a bit about why is there E and pi? Like, I think a lot of people go down those rabbit holes, but I think this is great.

Claude Science came out, they're creating these seats, it is a model for tech platforms to do these offers for other developers to come in and use their tools so that Anthropic can provide a better service to people.

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Wondering Thoughts.

Today I'm joined by Professor Michael Levin.

Professor Levin, thanks for joining us.

It's a pleasure to be able to talk to you and to learn from you.

The ship of Theseus idea is fascinating.

You know what you would really vibe with? You know who Michael Levin is? No.

He's like a biologist guy, but what he talks about is how we are, our bodies... are these masses of self-directed cells, and the cells all have their own agenda, and the groups that the cells kind of mass themselves into, they have their own agendas.

Right.

You just say everything has it to some degree and you enter into a kind of scientific relativism.

This is the Michael Levin tack on this particular issue.

Everything is cognition, or rather everything engages in cognition to some degree, even electrons going around nuclei or bacteria.

It is, as he calls it, super panpsychism of a kind, which means we're left with no privileged place for persons.

They become part of a grey goo of cognition.

Slightly more cognition in quantity, perhaps, but no different in quality.

Because People like Michael Levin admit they cannot draw.

They cannot draw a line between people and other animals or computers.

On AI adoption patterns, two pieces of commentary are gaining real traction elsewhere.

Complexity scientist Ricard Sol and biologist Michael Levin modeled large language model adoption, the way epidemiologists model contagion.

Populations move from occasional use, to regular use, to what the authors call persistent dependence, and once adoption crosses a critical threshold, small increases in usage can trigger a sudden, population-wide loss of competence.

It is a mathematical model with no cognitive test data behind it, not a measured finding, though its language of immunization, reducing exposure and preserving the ability to go back, shape product decisions about assistant friction well before anyone actually measures whether the underlying claim holds.

I actually think it's quite precisely important.

One person that I just want to bookmark who's brilliant on this specific topic is Michael Levin.

I don't know if you're familiar with any of his work.

Did he say the immune system example?

[laughs]

Well, Michael Levin was talking about being able to communicate.

He's building an AI interface where you can basically monitor how your organs are feeling-

Right