Project Summary
What is life? How did life on earth begin? We are proposing a new way of looking for possible answers to these questions. Our research is based on the idea that a fundamental characteristic of all living things is that they are able to interpret aspects of their environment. For example, a microbe may be able to interpret the presence of a sugar molecule as a sign that ‘dinner’ is ‘over there’. We propose that surprisingly simple entities may be able to interpret signs. Specifically, we wish to investigate the possibility that small molecules of ribonucleic acid (RNA) may be capable of interpretation. To do so it will first be necessary to develop a clearer understanding of ‘interpretation’, and a core part of our project is devoted to this philosophical task. The starting point for developing our new definition of interpretation will be the latest work on C. S. Peirce’s semiotics (theory of signs). Peirce’s semiotics also underpins the theological branch of our project. Peirce proposed that all signs have a triadic structure (representamen, object and interpretant). Underlying this triadic structure of sign-processes he discerned a three-fold pattern in the most fundamental structures of reality. The theological part of our proposal is that these three-fold patterns in the world – including the triadic structure of signs and interpretations – are vestiges of the Trinity in creation. Our aim, then, is to develop a new philosophical definition of ‘interpretation’ which will, on the one hand, provide a novel approach to the scientific question of the origin of life and, on the other hand, will open up a fresh theological understanding of God’s creating and sustaining of the world – a world in which somewhere, somehow, inanimate matter first became an interpreting entity, a living thing.

Team Consultants
Philip Clayton, Professor of Religion, Claremont Graduate University, Claremont, CA
Terrence Deacon, Professor of Biological Anthropology and Linguistics, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA
Niels Gregersen, Professor, University of Aarhus, Copenhagen, Denmark
John Haught, Distinguished Research Professor, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C.
Mike Higton, Senior Lecturer in Theology, University of Exeter, Devon, United Kingdom
Jesper Hoffmeyer, Associate Professor, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
Stuart Kauffman, Professor of Biological Sciences and Physics and Astronomy
Adjunct Professor of Philosophy, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada
J. Law, Theology, Canterbury
Harold Morowitz, Clarence J. Robinson Professor of Biology and Natural Philosophy, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA
Rachel Muers, Lecturer in Christian Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds, United Kingdom
Bruce Weber, Professor of Biochemistry, California State University, Fullerton, Fullerton, CA
Mark Wynn, Senior Lecturer, University of Exeter, Devon, United Kingdom
  
Project Associate: Experimental Scientist:
John Bryant, Emeritus Professor, University of Exeter, Devon, United Kingdom