num_pages: 153
description: The gene's eye view of life proposed in Richard Dawkins acclaimed bestseller The Selfish Gene  sees living bodies as mere vehicles for the replication of genetic codes. But in The Music of Life  world renowned physiologist Denis Noble argues that to truly understand life we must look beyond the selfish gene to consider life on a much wider variety of levels.Life Noble asserts is a kind of music a symphonic interplay between genes cells organs body and environment. He weaves this musical metaphor throughout this personal and deeply lyrical work illuminating ideas that might otherwise be daunting to non-scientists. In elegant prose Noble sets out a cutting-edge alternative to the gene's eye view offering a radical switch of perception in which genes are seen as prisoners and the organism itself is a complex system of many interacting levels. In his more expansive view life emerges as a process the ebb and flow of activity in an intricate web of connections. He introduces readers to the realm of systems biology a field that has been growing in strength in the past decade. Noble himself one of the founders of this field argues modern systems biology may be the view we need to adopt to gain a deeper understanding of the nature of life.Drawing on his experiences in his research on the heartbeat and on evolutionary biology development medicine philosophy linguistics and Chinese culture Noble presents us with a profound and very modern reflection on the nature of life.
language: English
title: The Music of Life: Biology Beyond Genes
publisher: Oxford University Press