Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive

Lifes Edge is a profound, lyrical, and fascinating exploration of one of the biggest questions of all: What is life? Carl Zimmer investigates this question by examining the edges of life, where it begins and ends. He explores astounding examples of life at its most bizarre, tries his own hand at evolving life in a test tube, and charts the obsession with Dr Frankensteins monster and how Coleridge came to believe the whole universe was alive.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 368 pages
Publication date: 09 June 2022
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

Lifes Edge: An Exploration of the Boundaries of Life

Lifes Edge is a profound, lyrical, and fascinating exploration of the boundaries of life. Written by a master science writer at the height of his skills, this book offers a newfound appreciation for the wonder and complexity of life itself.

We all assume we know what life is, but as scientists continue to unravel the mysteries of the living world, they find it increasingly difficult to locate the edges of life, where it begins and ends. What exactly does it mean to be alive? Is a virus alive? Is a foetus?

Carl Zimmer, a renowned science writer, takes on one of the biggest questions of all: What is life? The answer seems obvious until you attempt to answer it seriously. Is the apple sitting on your kitchen counter alive, or is only the apple tree it came from deserving of the word? If we cannot answer this question on Earth, how will we know when and if we discover alien life on other worlds?

This question hangs over some of society's most charged conflicts, such as whether a fertilized egg is a living person and when we should declare a person legally dead.

Lifes Edge is a fascinating investigation by one of the most celebrated science writers of our time. Zimmer revels in astounding examples of life at its most bizarre, whether he is handling pythons in Alabama or searching for hibernating bats in the Adirondacks. He even tries his own hand at evolving life in a test tube with unnerving results.

Charting the obsession with Dr. Frankenstein's monster and how Coleridge came to believe the whole universe was alive, Zimmer leads us into the labs and minds of researchers working on engineering life from the ground up.

Through his captivating storytelling and deep insights, Lifes Edge offers a fresh perspective on the nature of life and challenges our preconceptions about what it means to be alive. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the mysteries of the living world and the boundaries of human knowledge.

Weight: 260g
Dimension: 130 x 197 x 25 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781529069433