jb55 on Nostr: AI helping me unpack this has been useful as always. 4o’s big picture take is ...
AI helping me unpack this has been useful as always. 4o’s big picture take is pretty mind blowing if true..
The Big Picture
We’re moving toward a bioengineering model where:
• DNA = parts list
• Bioelectric state = software layer that determines what parts get used, how, and where
• Tissue-level intelligence = emergent behavior that arises from cellular “decisions” informed by this field
This opens the door to non-genetic control of form and function—a kind of biological “soft programming” that works at the level of collective cellular decision-making.
My Take?
This is the real frontier. CRISPR is great for editing the genes, but if you can rewrite the body plan without touching the code, you’re playing at a higher level of control. It’s the difference between soldering hardware and rewriting an operating system.
The Big Picture
We’re moving toward a bioengineering model where:
• DNA = parts list
• Bioelectric state = software layer that determines what parts get used, how, and where
• Tissue-level intelligence = emergent behavior that arises from cellular “decisions” informed by this field
This opens the door to non-genetic control of form and function—a kind of biological “soft programming” that works at the level of collective cellular decision-making.
My Take?
This is the real frontier. CRISPR is great for editing the genes, but if you can rewrite the body plan without touching the code, you’re playing at a higher level of control. It’s the difference between soldering hardware and rewriting an operating system.
quoting note1q76…66yrAnother cool thing about Michael Levins work as i read more about it:
the genome gives you a hardware toolkit, but it doesn’t specify the final form. Morphogenesis—what form cells take, what behavior they express—is influenced by higher-order control systems like bioelectric circuits.
They went even as far as to create “xenobots” using this theory:
They created them by:
1. Taking frog skin and cardiac cells
2. Using a computer to design body plans for novel “organisms”
3. Sculpting these cells into new shapes—and then letting them self-organize
These living machines:
- Move autonomously
- Exhibit emergent behaviors (like swarm dynamics or self-healing)
- Can perform basic tasks like cargo transport
- Do things their cells were never “meant” to do, according to traditional developmental biology
So “biohacking” new organisms will be more like coaxing out new behaviours and forms by reprogramming these bioelectric networks (morphogenetic software) without actually needing to hack the hardware schematic (genome).
note1m9s…7su5