severoon t1_jbouxw9 wrote
Reply to comment by RaptureAusculation in I just learned that the known shortest DNA in an “organism” is about 1700 base pairs in a certain virus. Is there a minimum amount of “code” required for an organism (or virus) to function in any capacity? by mcbergstedt
Also consider that "life" is likely to be an arbitrary feature in this discussion.
If you have a molecule that happens to be an enzyme which builds itself, you have yourself a self-replicating thing. Is it "alive"? Definitely not.
Well that's one feature of "life" but it's one that most people tend to think of only in the context of life. But all the features we typically think of in the context of life exist in much simpler, not-alive things.
By looking for the simplest thing we consider "alive," no matter how we define that, it's likely to end up being much simpler than what we would feel comfortable calling "life."
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