There has been much discussion into whether or not viruses are alive. I personally feel that viruses are in fact not alive, and I will now explain why I feel this way. There are seven characteristics of life, and they include heredity, homeostasis, reproduction, cellular organization, response, metabolism, and growth and development. This list comprises what all living things must do in order to stay alive. While a virus may seem like they do some of these, all characteristics of life are required to be classified as a living organism. Viruses lack any sort of cellular organization (nucleus, mitochondria, cell membrane, etc.) to complete any cellular activities, so a virus cannot be a cell if it lacks this. Some scientists argue that a virus
