[b_sharp]

I hope she realizes that at the quantum level there is no difference between the living and the non-living. Even if they are brain eaters. :)

Even though there is no distinct dividing line between what is considered alive and what is not when you get to the point of viruses, prions and the discussion of when life starts at abiogenesis, many feel that there is a mystic 'something' that invests the living with properties not seen in the non living. (the soul?)

This is probably why most have a difficult time understanding how life can come from non-life at the time of abiogenesis. This is also why creationists bring up the impossibility of life from non-life as determined by Pasteur even though the two systems are not related in any way.

[Thatcherite]

Even though there is no distinct dividing line between what is considered alive and what is not when you get to the point of viruses, prions and the discussion of when life starts at abiogenesis, many feel that there is a mystic 'something' that invests the living with properties not seen in the non living. (the soul?)

I think you have hit the nail on the head here. Some are desperate that "aliveness" or "the will to live" or "the soul" should NOT be an emergent phenomenon of the laws of physical nature applied to complex colections of organic molecules (eg human beings) or indeed some hypothetical future AI construct of silicon and metal running a vastly complex piece of software.