Sawaal-Jawaab: 'The evolution of living matter'

Title: The evolution of living matter Speaker: Prof. Vidyanand Nanjundiah, Centre for Human Genetics (Bangalore) Living creatures are made of ordinary matter. We have a fairly good idea of how they are constructed. Our understanding of how they function keeps improving. Where have they come from, and what is responsible for their astonishing variety? It turns out that life on earth has evolved from a few simple forms. Darwin and Wallace gave one explanation for their evolution, known as natural selection; it invokes the past to explain the present. Historical explanations have been put forward too, involving physical laws, or even chance. We will touch on the many ways in which to think about evolution. (image source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ape_skeletons.png)