There's a New Law of Nature — And It Changes Everything We Know About Life

Please join my mailing list here 👉 https://briankeating.com/list to win a meteorite 💥 Michael Wong recently discussed theory of evolution on TED: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSrf7ErdHWA — in this conversation, we go deeper on the law of increasing functional information and what it means for life, complexity, and the future of science. 🔔 Subscribe for new episodes each week 🎧 Ad-free episodes on Patreon: patreon.com/drbriankeating INTO THE IMPOSSIBLE — where Nobel Prize winners, physicists, and bold thinkers explore the biggest questions in science. Is there a second arrow of time? Astrobiologist and planetary scientist Dr. Michael Wong joins Brian Keating to explore the law of increasing functional information — a proposed new law of nature that may explain how complexity evolves across minerals, biology, AI, and the cosmos. Dr. Michael Wong of the Carnegie Institution for Science has been working with a cross-disciplinary group of scientists — the "Missing Law Group" — to propose something bold: a new law of nature. Their law of increasing functional information argues that evolving systems, whether biological or not, tend toward greater complexity and function over time. In this conversation, Brian and Michael unpack what functional information actually means, how it differs from Shannon entropy, and why it may describe something fundamental about the universe we live in. From the formation of minerals in stellar atmospheres to the evolution of life on Earth, Michael walks through how this framework applies across planetary science, astrobiology, and even cancer research. Brian pushes on the hard questions — the Fermi paradox, the boundary conditions of the law, its relationship to the second law of thermodynamics, and whether it truly qualifies as a "law" at all. Sean Carroll blurbed the book and later called it out on his podcast — Brian asks Michael about that tension directly. They also get into panspermia, the contingent role of cosmic collisions in shaping Earth's evolutionary history, the search for biosignatures on Mars and beyond, and what the rise of generative AI looks like through the lens of selection for function. This is a wide-ranging, technically honest conversation about one of the most ambitious proposals in contemporary science. Key Takeaways: 00:00:35 There May Be a Second Arrow of Time — and It Points Toward Complexity 00:01:35 The Law of Increasing Functional Information Explains How the Universe Evolves 00:07:15 Functional Information Measures How Well a System Performs a Specific Function 00:11:30 Three Universal Selection Pressures Drive All Evolving Systems 00:18:00 Mineral Evolution on Earth Is a Measurable Proof of the Law in Action 00:22:00 The Law Is a Tendency, Not a Guarantee — It Doesn't Resolve the Fermi Paradox 00:27:00 Life and Non-Life Contain the Same Building Blocks — the Difference Is in the Distributions 00:32:15 Cosmic Collisions Didn't Derail Evolution — They Opened New Possibility Spaces 00:50:00 Cancer Behaves Like an Evolving System — and That Could Change How We Treat It 01:05:15 AI Is a New Form of Evolving Life — and Without Stronger Selection Pressure, It's DangerousFeatured Guest ➡️ Follow Michael Wong 🌐 Website: https://miquai.myportfolio.com/ 📚 The book: Time’s Second Arrow (co-authored with Robert Hazen) : https://www.amazon.co.uk/Times-Second-Arrow-Evolution-Nature/dp/1324105488 — Brian's Links Join this channel to get access to perks like monthly Office Hours: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmXH_moPhfkqCk6S3b9RWuw/join 📚 Get my books: Think Like a Nobel Prize Winner: https://a.co/d/03ezQFu Focus Like a Nobel Prize Winner: https://a.co/d/hi50U9U Losing the Nobel Prize: http://amzn.to/2sa5UpA Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (audiobook): https://a.co/d/iZPi9Un Follow me to ask questions of my guests: 🏄‍♂️ Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrBrianKeating 🔔 Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/DrBrianKeating?sub_confirmation=1 📝 Mailing list: http://briankeating.com/list ✍️ Blog: https://briankeating.com/blog 🎙️ Audio-only: https://briankeating.com/podcast — #physics #astrobiology #complexity #evolutionoflife #briankeating #intotheimpossible Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices