Life as We Know It

<P>Preface; <STRONG>Christian de Duve</STRONG>. Foreword; <STRONG>David J. Chapman</STRONG>. Brief Introduction; <STRONG>Joseph Seckbach</STRONG>. Acknowledgements; <STRONG>Joseph Seckbach</STRONG>. List of authors and their addresses. <BR>PART 1: BIODIVERSITY AND EXTREMOPHILES. The Extremophiles: Diversity of Microbial Environments; <STRONG>J. Seckbach</STRONG>. Prokaryotic Life; <STRONG>A. Oren.</STRONG> The Algae–Diverse Life Forms and Global Importance; <STRONG>R.L. Chapman, D. Waters</STRONG>. Fungal Lives; <STRONG>I.K. Ross</STRONG>. Life in Saline and Hypersaline Environments; <STRONG>A. Oren</STRONG>. Thermophilic Communities as Autonomous Ecosystems; <STRONG>E. Bonch-Osmolovskaya</STRONG>. Life in Ice; <STRONG>N. Gunde-Cimerman</STRONG>. Life under Pressure: Deep-Sea Microbial Ecology; <STRONG>Ch. Tamburini</STRONG>. <BR>PART 2: LIFE IN THE CONTEXT OF THE NEW SCIENCE OF ASTROBIOLOGY. The Origin of Life on Earth and in the Universe. Early Precursors of Life in the Solar Nebula; <STRONG>J. Llorca.</STRONG> Is Life on Earth Accidental? Natural Selection and the Second Law of Thermodynamics; <STRONG>M.E. Schrader</STRONG>. From the Minimal Genome to the Minimal Cell: Theoretical and Experimental Investigations; <STRONG>P. Stano, et al</STRONG>. The Evolution of Life on Earth and in the Universe. Numerical Analysis of Biocomplexity; <STRONG>D. Deamer and J. Evans.</STRONG> Hepatitis B Virus: Conjectures on Human Interactions and Origin of Life; <STRONG>B. Blumberg.</STRONG> The Record of Early Life: In Search of Biosignatures; <STRONG>A.M. Carnerup, <EM>et al.</EM></STRONG> Ground Truth: The Epistemology of Searching for the Earliest Life on Earth; <STRONG>E.C. Rose, <EM>et al</EM></STRONG>. Eukaryogenesis: The Origin of the Eukaryotes; <STRONG>P.J.L. Bell</STRONG>. Symbiotic Forms of Life; <STRONG>J.J. Lee.</STRONG> Symbiosis: The Way of All Life; <STRONG>M.B. Saffo</STRONG>. Can There be a Limit on the Complexity of Life?; <STRONG>T.Shah</STRONG>. Evolution of Intelligence; <STRONG>C. Maccone</STRONG>. The Distribution of Life in the Universe. Searching other Worlds for Life as We Know It; <STRONG>Ch.P. McKay</STRONG>. The Role of Comets and meteorites in the Origin of Life; <STRONG>J.M. Trigo-Rodríguez</STRONG>. Astronomical Constraints for Life on Terrestrial Planets; <STRONG>P. Ehrenfreund and E.L. Martin.</STRONG> Prerequisites for the Evolution of Life on Exoplanets; <STRONG>H. Lammer, <EM>et al.</EM></STRONG> Life as an Unfolding Biocosmos; <STRONG>J. Svoboda.</STRONG> We Have Not Detected Extraterrestrial Life, Or Have We?; <STRONG>C.H. Lineweaver</STRONG>. The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence; <STRONG>S. Shostak</STRONG>. Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence; <STRONG>J. Krupicka</STRONG>. An Alternative Method for the Scientific Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life: The "Local SETI"; <STRONG>M. Teodorani</STRONG>. The Destiny of Life in the Universe. Destinies of the Universe and Life: The Final frontiers of Cosmology and Astrobiology; <STRONG>J. Chela-Flores</STRONG>. Destiny of Life and Religious attitudes; <STRONG>G. Coyne.<BR></STRONG>PART 3: DEEPER ISSUES OF THE PHENOMENON OF LIFE. Philosophical and Theological Aspects of Life. Life in the Universe: Philosophical and Theological issues; <STRONG>R.J. Russell</STRONG>. Consciousness; <STRONG>R.J. Aumann.</STRONG> The Soul and the World-to Come According to Maimonides; <STRONG>G. Laras</STRONG>. Science and Religion: Some Suggestions for Conceptual Harmonizing Constraints; <STRONG>Y. Ne’e-man</STRONG>. Understanding the Nature of Life: A Matter of Definition or Theory?; <STRONG>C.E. Cleland.</STRONG> "And You Shall Choose Life"; <STRONG>S. Riskin</STRONG>. When Form Outlasts Its Medium; <STRONG>A. Elitzur</STRONG>. Epistemological Pluralism: Realities as Species-specific Interpretations of the Material World; <STRONG>T. Shah</STRONG>. Temperature Gradients as a Major Impetus Driving Prebiotic Evolution; <STRONG>K. Matsuno</STRONG>. Human Life as a Social Phenomenon. Life during Clinical Death: The "Near Death Experience" Phenomenon; <STRONG>N. Gadoth</STRONG>. Beauty in Nature; <STRONG>N. Gunde-Cimerman and P. Zalar</STRONG>. All Things Bright and Beautiful: The Hidden Cosmos of Microscopic Planktonic Algae; <STRONG>G.W. Beakes</STRONG>. Life and Pro Sports; <STRONG>L. Funderburke</STRONG> Artificial Life. Artificial Life: From Life-As-We-Know-It to Life-As It-Could Be; <STRONG>M. Sipper</STRONG>. Life-Cycles of Life; <STRONG>N. Umiel</STRONG>.<BR>PART 4: Summary and Conclusions. What do We Call Life? A Brief Outlook on Life; <STRONG>J. Seckbach, <EM>et al.</EM></STRONG> Organism Index. Subject Index. Alphabetical List of authors/pages.</P>