The Physics of Life (ft. It's Okay to be Smart & PBS Eons!)

Our universe is prone to increasing disorder and chaos. So how did it generate the extreme complexity we see in life? Actually, the laws of physics themselves may demand it.

Tweet at us! @pbsspacetime
Email us! pbsspacetime [at] gmail [dot] com

Help translate our videos!

Previous Episode:
The Unruh Effect

How did life begin? We can seek the answer in the chemistry of the early earth, or in the biology of the first cell. In fact our friends at PBS Eons and It’s OK to be Smart will do just that in companion videos to this one. But we all know that chemistry and biology are just applied physics. So can we approach the question of the origin and the very nature of life from the point of view of physics? We’re sure going to try.

Hosted and written by Matt O'Dowd
Produced by Rusty Ward
Graphics by Grayson Blackmon
Assistant Editing and Sound Design by Mike Petrow and Linda Huang

Special thanks to our Patreon Big Bang, Quasar and Hypernova Supporters:

Big Bang
CoolAsCats
David Nicklas
Anton Lifshits
Joey Redner

Quasar
Tambe Barsbay
Mayank M. Mehrota
Mars Yentur
Mark Rosenthal
Dean Fuqua
Roman Pinchuk
ColeslawPurdie

Hypernova
Edmund Fokschaner
Matthew O’Connor
Eugene Lawson
Barry Hatfield
Martha Hunt
Joseph Salomone
Chuck Zegar
Jordan Young
Ratfeast
John Hofmann
Craig Peterson

Thanks to our Patreon Gamma Ray Burst Supporters:
James Hughes
Fabian Olesen
Kris Fernet
Jane Meyers
James Flowers
Greg Allen
TJMadison
Denys Ivanov
Nick Virtue
Alexey Eromenko
Nicholas Rose
Scott Gossett
Mark Vasile
Patrick Murray
Sultan Alkhulaifi
Alex Seto
Michal-Peanut Karmi
Erik Stein
Kevin Warne
JJ Bagnell
J Rejc
Avi Goldfinger
John Pettit
Florian Stinglmayr
Benoit Pagé-Guitard
Nathan Leniz
Brandon Labonte
David Crane
Greg Weiss

[Smonjirez]

"What is my purpose?"
"You are an agent in the inexorable trend to maximize entropy."
"Oh my god..."

[besmart]

Marvel: "Avengers: Infinity War is the most ambitious crossover event in history?"
PBS Space Time, Eons, It's Okay To Be Smart: "GOGGLE UP!"

[jolez_]

2:30
"Your cells contain 6 billion base pairs of DNA"
There are hundreds of types of cells with DNA and you showed the one type (red blood cell) that doesn't have it.

[chris_]

Can I just say how lucky I feel to be alive at a time when this channel is possible, and wonderful people like everyone involved in this have taken the time to educate and inspire us all? Thank you PBS!

[jtdh]

10:35
Finally an answer to the age old question about the purpose of life.
"In service of the spread of disorder and dullness."
"An agent in the inexorable trend to maximise the entropy of spacetime."
These will make two brilliant t-shirts!Please PBS Spacetime!

[agiar]

This reminds me of a joke that I read online once:

A creationist was arguing that the evolution of species from simpler to more complex violated the second law of thermodynamics. They claimed that such a transformation would require a colossal input of outside energy.

I stayed up all night trying to think of what sort of energy source that could be.

...then it _dawned_ on me. ;)

[stiimuli]

Sup my fellow localized eddies of order

[Teth]

2:36 Talking about how many base pairs of DNA there are in cells and you show an active red blood cell, i.e. THE ONLY HUMAN CELL WITH NO DNA IN IT!

The iron-y. (Get it? Because red blood cells are red because of iron? I'll leave now.)

[natesmith]

"We all know chemistry and biology are just applied physics." :D You tell em.

[markdelej]

“We are something the whole universe is doing in the same way a wave is something that the whole ocean is doing” - Alan Watts.

We are a process the universe does that allows the universe to experience itself

[Sayquidnidly]

I keep telling my mom that my room WAS clean but then that dang entropy came in and messed it all up

[jackxiao]

"What is my purpose?"

"You dissipate energy."

... "Oh my god."

[JohnSmith-zfdd]

For other fellow layman, I recommend this order of view: PBS Space Time -> It's Okay To Be Smart -> PBS Eons. Because in PBS Space Time they first explain the physics possibilities of life that underlay everything. In It's Okay To Be Smart they explain the abiogenesis origin of life from primordial soup. And finally, in PBS Eons they explain LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor) that hypothesised as the first living thing on earth. I applaud this collaborative work between It's Okay To Be Smart, PBS Eons, and PBS Space Time. I also hope for another collaborative works in the future.

[MrSevillian]

My favorite video of the series so far, and I've seen many. It addresses one of the biggest existential questions by integrating the other sciences into a holistic view, keeping it understandable all along. Really grand.

[mrhoustonn]

I always thought we were just big molecules of energy carriers/converters, highly structured because of the multi-structure potential of C, H and O, but never thought about the entropy side. This goes so so much deeper, just amazing. PBS never cease to amaze me. So congratulations, you people are some of the true heroes of our world, no exaggeration, education is everything; thank you for your work.

[mikejvasquez]

Here's a little physics joke, maybe. A neutron walked into a bar and asked, "How much for the gin and tonic?" The bartender smiled wryly and replyed, "For you, no charge." Well have a good day or evening everyone.

[georgimmitev]

of all the cells you could have chosen you picked the one that doesn't have a nucleus...

[cosmicmutant]

i was making a video for school and i had to edit the video for like 2 days. i have gained so much respect for the editors of this video cause i now know how long making a script filming and escpecialy editing takes.
amazing video

[albertoardurafabregat]

If we are agents in the inexorable trend to maximize entropy, this makes the awareness of our existence so much the more awe-inspiring and opens the questions of why do we believe in right and wrong, good and bad in the first place?
Why are we so attracted to beauty, liberty and love if they would all be an illusion and no one is free to escape death and annihilation?
Why are we called to and orient ourselves to complexity and perfection if that means we’re disobeying the deepest and most important laws of nature? Why do we seek to rebel against the laws of the Universe?

[esmemcdermott]

Tbh this is my favorite quote now

“I guess that makes you a little eddy of order, a momentary fluctuation of interesting, but ultimately in service of the spread of disorder and dullness.”