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Denis Noble Quotes

born 1936 England

Denis Noble CBE FRS FMedSci MAE (born 16 November 1936) is a British biologist who held the Burdon Sanderson Chair of Cardiovascular Physiology at the University of Oxford from 1984 to 2004 and was appointed Professor Emeritus and co-Director of Computational Physiology. He is one of the pioneers of systems biology and developed the first viable mathematical model of the working heart in 1960.

England
Biologists

Random Denis Noble quote

8 quotes

The Principle of Biological Relativity... simply states that there is no privileged level of causation in biological systems.

The real players in the action of life are the proteins. ...DNA is in comparison rather passive.

The gene-centered view... is a metaphorical polemic: the invention of a colourful metaphor to interpret scientific discovery. It is not a straightforward empirical scientific hypothesis.

Every time a protein is needed, the appropriate chemical 'code' is 'read off' the gene; this gives the pattern of chemical elements that will make that protein what it is. Our genes encode the sequences of 100 000 or so proteins that make up the human body.

[T]here is no privileged level of causation, which is the central statement of the theory of Biological Relativity.

[T]he general principle of relativity informs the whole book.

DNA does nothing outside the context of a cell containing these protein systems, just as a CD can do nothing without a CD reader. So we have the paradox that proteins are required for the machinery to read the code to produce the proteins.

[T]he music of life has no conductor.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Denis Noble (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.