"Tumbleweed" wrote in message
...

"Franz Heymann" wrote in message
...

"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
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In article ,
Franz Heymann wrote:

| That's a good question. I tnd to tink of anything which
replicates
| itself as being in some sense alive, but that may well be
wrong.

Prions.

You have just given the second example which proves me wrong.

Ever since that troublemaker synthesised urea, the boundary
between
life and non-life has got more confused.

In my newfound ignorance, I am now also not quite certain as to
where
viruses stand in the live/dead stakes.

Franz


You define what 'life' means, then you know whether it meets that
criteria*.
100 years ago people thought there was a 'vital essence' or 'spark'
that
constituted 'life', but now we know thats not the case (well, most
of us
maybe?). Now its a matter of definition only.

I would be tempted to think that the only living objects are the
eukaryotic cells in any of their myriad manifestations and
associations.

Franz