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As I said in another comment, I think that mitochondria are fascinating, understudied and a rich area for research. We are bound to the myriad other pieces of

As I said in another comment, I think that mitochondria are fascinating, understudied and a rich area for research. We are bound to the myriad other pieces of DNA that all have different evolutionary histories within us, we are symbiotically bound to many strands of life on many levels. We are just one strand, a part of a singular whole, bound to all strands of life beyond us. This view of life led me to science. I totally think that this view of biology is not properly appreciated by most scientists. But this article was presented as a scientific piece and made the explicit claim that mitochondria were alive which is a semantic argument that doesn't have a scientific answer. It is a well written piece that made it to the top of hacker news and it's great to see the debate. But it just isn't true that mitochondria are alive by our currently accepted definition of alive. This is an old debate in biology that was settled years ago. There is nothing in this paper that wasn't known to mainstream science decades ago, but it is presented as a novel scientific viewpoint.

dr_dshiv 2y ago
> it just isn't true that mitochondria are alive by our currently accepted definition of alive. This is an old debate in biology that was settled years ago. Sorry, but that’s an overreach. There are many “accepted” definitions” of life across different scientific fields. According to Wikipedia, there are at least 123 definitions of life — and there is not scientific consensus. Mitochondria are alive based on some definitions and not alive based on others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life Expecting life to have total autonomy in self-sustainability is absurd. Otherwise somatic cells or even people would be not alive. And the argument that mitochondria are not alive because they can’t encode all their own proteins — well, I’ll point out that humans can’t produce all amino acids, either. As a thought experiment, if humans couldn’t produce a certain essential protein — and had to rely on a symbiont, would that mean humans weren’t alive? Finally I’ll point out that Mitochondria can be healthy or flourishing — and they can be sick and die. How can something that is not alive, die? It’s ok to argue for a narrow definition. But please don’t present this argument as though you are the defender of clear scientific conclusions. There simply isn’t consensus on this across the sciences.
- meneton 2y ago
  I agree I didn't phrase that right. It was a short cut. There has been debate over whether mitochondria can be called alive since at least 1890. For many years the vast majority of mitochondrial biologists have avoided the binary alive/not alive classification because there is a spectrum of 'livingness' and we can draw the line anywhere we like. Picking a different line position is not scientific, it is semantics. What do we mean by the term 'alive'? The article presented a profound new way of viewing the living state of mitochondria that was going to transform the world. It said nothing new, and failed to make any reference to the long term debate. But it was a nicely written interesting article and mitochondria are going to be hugely important therapeutic area in the future.

dr_dshiv 2y ago

> it just isn't true that mitochondria are alive by our currently accepted definition of alive. This is an old debate in biology that was settled years ago. Sorry, but that’s an overreach. There are many “accepted” definitions” of life across different scientific fields. According to Wikipedia, there are at least 123 definitions of life — and there is not scientific consensus. Mitochondria are alive based on some definitions and not alive based on others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life Expecting life to have total autonomy in self-sustainability is absurd. Otherwise somatic cells or even people would be not alive. And the argument that mitochondria are not alive because they can’t encode all their own proteins — well, I’ll point out that humans can’t produce all amino acids, either. As a thought experiment, if humans couldn’t produce a certain essential protein — and had to rely on a symbiont, would that mean humans weren’t alive? Finally I’ll point out that Mitochondria can be healthy or flourishing — and they can be sick and die. How can something that is not alive, die? It’s ok to argue for a narrow definition. But please don’t present this argument as though you are the defender of clear scientific conclusions. There simply isn’t consensus on this across the sciences.

meneton 2y ago
I agree I didn't phrase that right. It was a short cut. There has been debate over whether mitochondria can be called alive since at least 1890. For many years the vast majority of mitochondrial biologists have avoided the binary alive/not alive classification because there is a spectrum of 'livingness' and we can draw the line anywhere we like. Picking a different line position is not scientific, it is semantics. What do we mean by the term 'alive'? The article presented a profound new way of viewing the living state of mitochondria that was going to transform the world. It said nothing new, and failed to make any reference to the long term debate. But it was a nicely written interesting article and mitochondria are going to be hugely important therapeutic area in the future.