Abstract
Theoretical biology is a subdiscipline of biology that may have a significant impact on the further development of biology. Its meaning for the biological sciences is comparable to the meaning of theoretical physics for the physical sciences. Theoretical physics, and especially mathematical physics, is concerned with the description of physical phenomena in mathematical terms. Beyond this, however, it makes abstractions from physical reality and puts them into a conceptual framework in such a way that from abstract models predictions can be made about the phenomenology of real systems. Theoretical biology is trying to do just that; and the fact that in doing so many concepts of the physical sciences are “taken over” and used to describe biological phenomena in an abstract manner provides an argument for considering theoretical biology as a legitimate domain in biophysics. Its aim, of course, is the unification of assemblies of facts and their simplification through the logic of a (abstract) concept, thus arriving at a deeper understanding and greater predictability.
Keywords
- Neuronal Network
- Entropy Production
- Living System
- Radioactive Iodine
- Dissipative Structure
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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© 1989 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Sybesma, C. (1989). Theoretical biology. In: Biophysics. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2239-6_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2239-6_12
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-0-7923-0030-4
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