Abstract
The book maps the history of life's origins and early evolution in context with evolution of the planet. The aim is to show that life is characterized by a dialectics of cellular closure on one hand, and its openness to biosphere on the other.
The reconstruction takes into account properties of contemporary life revealing "palimpsests" of the past, as well as interpretation of historical resources rooted in paleontology, geology, or kosmogony. Our planet provided resources and energy for syntheses of organic compounds as well as self-replicating prebiotic structures.
They enabled, upon separation from the mineral substrate of the planet, an appearance of both cellular closures and biosphere - in an inseparable unity. Such an emancipation was followed by evolution of sign systems and appearance of communication networks, both intracellular and biospherical.
These networks until now determine the existence of both cells and the biosphere, and provide a powerful reservoir of memory and experience reaching down to the roots of life. The book proceeds from planetogenesis and prebiotic evolution thtough the origin of organic structures (abiosphere) up to the genuine biosphere of living forms.
Data and facts are accompanied by theoretical reflections.