What Is Life? - Molecular Theory of the Living Cell - page 563

column of Table 16.1 . In contrast, the newly conceived correspondence principle
that connects physics and biology (which are arranged horizontally in the middle
row of Table 16.1 ) is referred to as the horizontal correspondence principle. Since
the vertical correspondence principle is formulated in terms of the quantum number
(which is associated with energy levels) and the horizontal correspondence princi-
ple is formulated in terms of information density (i.e., the amount of the algorithmic
complexity per unit volume of the information carrier) , we may also refer to the
former as e-correspondence principle ( e standing for energy) and the latter as the i-
correspondence principle ( i standing for information), which may be viewed as
another instance of the information-energy dichotomy found in physics and biology
(see Sect. 2.3.2 ) . Since, according to the information-energy complementarity
principle , information and energy are symmetric with respect to gnergy (in the
sense that they are complementary aspects of gnergy), if energy has its correspon-
dence principle, so should information. This may, in part, provide the theoretical
rationale for postulating the i-correspondence principle. If the i-correspondence
principle is valid, we can make the following far-reaching inferences:

1. Physics and biology may be connected via the Darwinian theory of the biological
evolution, just as energy and matter are connected via Einstein's special theory
of relativity (Shadowitz 1968), and consequently
2. Life may be viewed as a highly condensed form of information , just as matter can
be viewed as a highly condensed form of energy (see Table 2.5 and Statement
16.5) (Ji 2005a).

In 1932, Niels Bohr (1885-1962) delivered a lecture entitled “Light and Life” in
Copenhagen, which was later published in Bohr (1933). In that lecture Bohr
suggested that the phenomenon of life may be irreducible to physics and chemistry
just as the stability of atoms cannot be accounted for by Newtonian mechanics and
that, just as physicists are forced to accept quantum of action as a given, not
derivable from any other laws of physics, so biologists might have to accept the
phenomenon of life as a given, not derivable from physics nor from chemistry.
He also suggested that the notion of complementarity originating from atomic
physics may be applicable to biology. As is well known, the idea of complementar-
ity arose from an attempt to reconcile the wave-particle duality of light and
Heisenberg uncertainty relations (Hilgevoord 2006; Plotnitsky 2006). The wave
and particle natures of light are mutually exclusive (due to the mutual exclusion of
the experimental arrangements needed to measure these contrasting properties of
light) and yet both are essential to completely describe the behavior of light (e.g.,
interference phenomena requiring the wave nature of light and photoelectric effect
requiring the particle nature of light). Bohr, in effect, suggested that the comple-
mentarity concept may apply to the apparent conflict between the mechanistic
(based on physics and chemistry; synchronic sciences (?); see Sect. 2.6 ) and
teleological (unique to biology resulting from the biological evolution; diachronic
science (?); see Sect. 2.6 ) approaches to accounting for life (Bohr 1933).
Max Delbr uck (1906-1981) was inspired by Bohr's “Light and Life” lecture and

switched his field of research from physics to biology (McKaughan 2005; Stent

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