Great moments in research: Why I Stopped Worrying About the Definition of Life... And Why You Should as Well

Edouard Machery In several disciplines within science — evolutionary biology, molecular biology, astrobiology, synthetic biology, artificial life — and outside science — primarily, ethics — efforts to define life have recently multiplied. However, no consensus has emerged. In this article, I argue that this is no accident. I propose a dilemma showing that the project of defining life is either impossible or pointless. The notion of life at stake in this project is either the folk concept of life or a scientific concept. In the former case, empirical evidence shows that life cannot be defined. In the latter case, I argue that although defining life may be possible, it is pointless . I conclude that scientists, philosophers, and ethicists should discard the project of defining life.