[Fis] New Year Lecture

[PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ]

Dear John and FIS Colleagues,
Many thanks for this opening text of the NY Lecture. Indeed 
you have presented us an intricate panorama on one of the most obscure 
scientific problems of our time: the central theory of biology. As you say, 
we find with astonishment that there is literally no cell biology in 
evolution theory. And I would ad that there is no "information biology" 
either. A central theory becomes sort of a big Hall, where plenty of 
disciplinary corridors converge and later criss-cross among themselves. 
Darwinian theory is not that common hall for the really big, big science 
domain of biology. What are or where are the elements to rebuild the common 
Hall of the biological domain? I quote from your opening text:  
"It is as if the unicellular state delegates its progeny to interact with 
the environment as agents, collecting data to inform the recapitulating 
unicell of ecological
changes that are occurring. Through the acquisition and filtering of 
epigenetic marks via meiosis, fertilization, and embryogenesis, even on into 
adulthood, where the endocrine system dictates the length and depth of the 
stages of the life cycle, now known to be under epigenetic control, the 
unicell remains in effective synchrony with environmental changes."
It is really brilliant: a heads up reversal perspective. I think out of 
these ideas there are plenty of disciplinary excursions to make. One is 
"informational", another "topological". Putting together two different 
algorithmic descriptions and making them to build a torus (i.e., gastrula") 
as a universal departure for multicellularity also reminds the ideas of 
Stuart Pivart ("Omnia Ex Torus") about the primordials of multicellularity 
and the role of mechanical forces in the patterning of developmental 
processes. 
Echoing the ideas

discussed in the Royal Society meeting (November 2016), there is a pretty 
long list of elements to take into account together with epigenetic 
inheritance (symbiogenesis, viruses and mobile elements, multilevel 
selection, niche construction, genomic evolution...). As I have suggested 
above, essential informational ideas are missing too, and this absence of 
the informational perspective in the ongoing evo discussions is not a good 
thing. 
i any case, it is such a great theme to ponder...
Best wishes to all
--Pedro


   On Wed, 3 Jan 2018 07:15:43 -0800 JOHN TORDAY  wrote:
>Dear FIS Colleagues, I have attached my New Year Lecture at the invitation of Professor Pedro Clemente Marijuan Fernandez. The content relates a novel perspective on the mechanism of evolution from a cellular-molecular vantage-point. I welcome any and all comments and criticisms in the spirit of sharing ideas openly and
constructively. Best Wishes,
>
>
>John S. Torday PhD
>Professor
>Evolutionary Medicine
>UCLA

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