Abstract:

The Delphic Boat.  Amongst the questions asked by the Oracle of Delphi was this enigma. If we consider a boat made of planks, what is it that makes the boat a boat? This question is more than just a mind game: as time passes, some of the planks begin to rot and have to be replaced. There comes a time when not one of the original planks is left. The boat still looks like the original one, but in material terms it has changed. Is it still the same boat? The owner would certainly say yes, this is my boat. Yet none of the material it was originally built from is still there. If we take the boat to pieces: it is reduced to a pile of planks - but they are not the same ones as at the eginning! If we were to analyze the components of the boat, we would not learn very much - a boat made from planks of oak is different from a boat made from planks of pine, but this is fairly incidental. What is important about the material of the planks, apart from their relative stability over time, is the fact that it allows them to be shaped, so that they relate to each other in a certain way. The boat is not the material it is made from, but something else, much more interesting, which organizes the material of the planks: the boat is the relationship between the planks. Similarly, the study of lifeshould never be restricted to objects, but must look into their relationships. This is why a genome cannot, must not be regarded as simply a collection of genes. It is much more than that. But is this what the genome programs are exploring? A brief history will tell.