@article {Farnsworth2013Living-is-Infor,
	title = {Living is Information Processing: From Molecules to Global Systems},
	journal = {Acta Biotheoretica},
	volume = {61},
	number = {2},
	year = {2013},
	month = {June},
	pages = {203-222},
	abstract = {We extend the concept that life is an informational phenomenon, at every level of organisation, from molecules to the global ecological system. According to this thesis: (a) living is information processing, in which memory is maintained by both molecular states and ecological states as well as the more obvious nucleic acid coding; (b) this information processing has one overall function{\textendash}-to perpetuate itself; and (c) the processing method is filtration (cognition) of, and synthesis of, information at lower levels to appear at higher levels in complex systems (emergence). We show how information patterns, are united by the creation of mutual context, generating persistent consequences, to result in {\textquoteleft}functional information{\textquoteright}. This constructive process forms arbitrarily large complexes of information, the combined effects of which include the functions of life. Molecules and simple organisms have already been measured in terms of functional information content; we show how quantification may be extended to each level of organisation up to the ecological. In terms of a computer analogy, life is both the data and the program and its biochemical structure is the way the information is embodied. This idea supports the seamless integration of life at all scales with the physical universe. The innovation reported here is essentially to integrate these ideas, basing information on the {\textquoteleft}general definition{\textquoteright} of information, rather than simply the statistics of information, thereby explaining how functional information operates throughout life.},
	doi = {10.1007/s10441-013-9179-3},
	url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1210.5908},
	author = {Farnsworth, Keith D. and Nelson, John and Gershenson, Carlos}
}
@article {Zenil:2012,
	title = {Life as Thermodynamic Evidence of Algorithmic Structure in Natural Environments},
	journal = {Entropy},
	volume = {14},
	number = {11},
	year = {2012},
	pages = {2173{\textendash}2191},
	abstract = {In evolutionary biology, attention to the relationship between stochastic organisms and their stochastic environments has leaned towards the adaptability and learning capabilities of the organisms rather than toward the properties of the environment. This article is devoted to the algorithmic aspects of the environment and its interaction with living organisms. We ask whether one may use the fact of the existence of life to establish how far nature is removed from algorithmic randomness. The paper uses a novel approach to behavioral evolutionary questions, using tools drawn from information theory, algorithmic complexity and the thermodynamics of computation to support an intuitive assumption about the near optimal structure of a physical environment that would prove conducive to the evolution and survival of organisms, and sketches the potential of these tools, at present alien to biology, that could be used in the future to address different and deeper questions. We contribute to the discussion of the algorithmic structure of natural environments and provide statistical and computational arguments for the intuitive claim that living systems would not be able to survive in completely unpredictable environments, even if adaptable and equipped with storage and learning capabilities by natural selection (brain memory or DNA).},
	issn = {1099-4300},
	doi = {10.3390/e14112173},
	url = {http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/14/11/2173},
	author = {Zenil, Hector and Gershenson, Carlos and Marshall, James A. R. and Rosenblueth, David A.}
}
@article {doi:10.1162/artl.2007.13.1.91,
	title = {Live Evolving: Molecules, Mind, and Meaning. Christian De Duve. (2003, Oxford University Press.) Hardback, {\textsterling}25, $39. 358 pages},
	journal = {Artificial Life},
	volume = {13},
	number = {1},
	year = {2007},
	pages = {91-92},
	doi = {10.1162/artl.2007.13.1.91},
	url = {http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/artl.2007.13.1.91},
	author = {Gershenson, Carlos}
}
