Information and Genetics

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Peter:
[B][QUOTE]I found the above, which, even discounting the organic carbon
impurities, suggests that UV-B (at least) is rapidly
disapated in water.So if the amino-acids were at deep-sea location, that would
not be such a bar to production I guess.
[/b][/quote]Lipid molecules, major players in the abiogenesis debate, would float on the surface.------------------
http://www.hells-handmaiden.com

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Peter:
[B]A dust cloud resulting from a large enough asteroid collision could
produce particles in the atmosphere which would dissipate UV radiationIt is considered that in the early life of the solar system such impacts were not that rare.[/quote][/b]I'm thinking that most of the high frequency impact period would be over by the time we could start to think about abiogenesis. So as an energy source and UV shield, I'm not betting on asteroids. As suppliers of organic molecules though, they seem likely candidates.

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Could provoke siesmic activity resulting in heat release from
mantle (energy source).

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I suspect mantle heat release to have been very important, but not as a result of impacts. Hydrogen sulfide spews out of hydrothermal vents to this day. Last I heard, hydrogen sulfide eaters are considered to be the first complex organism. Still, that doesn't mean they were the first. In fact, they are pretty far down the chain it seems to me.------------------
http://www.hells-handmaiden.com

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Originally posted by Peter:
...but could the high presence of incoming rocks
have promoted an atmosphere much different to today
which would block UV for extended periods.

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Sure. I don't see why not, but whether it happened that way or not I do not know; and don't have time to try to look it up right now.

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As I understand current thinking it is considered that
many (varying sized) asteroid impacts happened in the
early life of the earth.

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That's how I understand it as well. The first billion years or so would have been hellish for that reason. The next billion, when life got its slow start, I don't know about. I need to check.------------------
http://www.hells-handmaiden.com

Maybe there's some sort of GNU public license for creationist propaganda?"Use of this material is freely available to those fighting evil."------------------
http://www.hells-handmaiden.com

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I'd search junk DNA for key phrases in the Bible. Such as "Hear oh Israel, the Lord your God is one Lord...

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Lol... that would be interesting.

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I'd look for ASCII characters in English, UNICODE for Hebrew, and the numerics for the Hebrew letters.

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God encoded in ASCII and UNICODE, eh? I don't think so. We made that stuff up. The only rational search would be for numbers, and then convert them to letters based on the ancient hebrew use of letters to represent numbers. God, obviously, spoke Hebrew.

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But, rather with some serious prayer, hard work and many CPU cycles, it could be done.

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Knock yourself out. Remember, you are going to have to get significantly long, exact quotes without resorting to statistical scrambling of the sequences-- as per, Bible Code investigations-- or the results will be invalid.

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But, if you know where to get the gene sequences for junk DNA, I'd appreciate a few references.

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If I am not mistaken... No webpage found at provided URL: ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/genbank------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

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It may be impossible to know the original intent, but we can know the result (not intent-this word was never mentioned by Gitt) is life. Life is a struggle for existence, and the ultimate goal is to keep the species alive.

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That isn't DNA's goal. DNA doesn't have a goal. DNA doesn't care if the species comes or goes, lives or dies, anymore than oxygen cares that metal oxydizes in its presence. DNA is just a molecule. It reacts with other molecules. That's it. We see the results and put a label on them-- life. But you can't argue backward from results to goals. We see the results of the combination of oxygen and hydrogen atoms. Do you really think it valid to claim that the result-- water-- is the goal of oxygen and hydrogen. We see a result of the molecular structure of water-- ice. Is that the goal of water?

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Life is a struggle for existence, and the ultimate goal is to keep the species alive.

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No it isn't. There is no goal.You can just as easily argue the reverse. More species have gone extinct than survive, thus the ultimate goal of life is extinction.

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Let's say that we found a comlex computer program that was target oriented to solve certain mathematical equations.

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What equation is DNA targetted to solve? Survival? A lot of molecules survive. Replication? Every replication is altered. It doesn't solve that equation very well. Survival of the species? Species are always changing and more lines go extinct than survive. It doesn't solve that equation very well either.

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We did not see the computer designer, so we cannot be certain what its' actual purpose is.

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hmmm.... I thought we had a program. Now we have the whole box.

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We did not see the computer designer, so we cannot be certain what its' actual purpose is.

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Agreed. We might be able to tell what it does, but not what it was designed to do.

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If I argued in the way that you did, I could say that there is no intent, purpose, or goal to solve equations, rather it is just a natural consequence of random chemical reactions between bits of metal, plastic, and electricity.

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There is no intent. It is a consequence of the mechanical workings of the parts. The intent was on the part of the designers. The machine doesn't embody intent or purpose.You want to argue backwards from what you see it doing to what it was designed to do and even to the conclusion that it was designed. Here is the problem. We don't infer that machines had designers because we see them doing something. Everything does something. We infer design primarily because we recognize human technology. We know what we build, we know the materials we use, and we know what our constructions look like. It is pattern recognition. None of these considerations apply in the case of DNA.

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The result of the DNA processes is life, and the goal is continued existence (and this goal is confirmed by natural selection).

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There is no goal.

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By excluding God from the definition, you have no organization mechanism.

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Wrong. We have chemical processes. DNA is just chemistry.

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Because it is obvious that the result of the computers interaction with the correct numerical equation is the correct solution, therefore we infer (and obviously know) the goal of the computer program was to find the correct answer (or at least that is what it is now).

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An inference is not the same as absolute knowledge. The last phrase in the sentence underlines your whole argument. We know what the thing does right now, but not what it used to do or was designed to do. This means it may once have done something very different or nothing in particular. If either is the case, you can't infer that it was designed to do what it does.

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Your argument really goes nowhere because of the relevant properties that all information systems resulting from intelligence share.

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Isn't that assuming the premise?

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We may not know the original purpose of the DNA (since we where not there), however we know that the goal and result of the processes that involves DNA today is life and its' continued existence. Hence it contains apobetics and pragmatics. According to Gitt's theroems and experimental evidence, any information system that contains apobetics and pragmatics is ultimately related to volition, and thus had to have an inteligent origin.

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This is self-contradictory.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com[This message has been edited by John, 09-06-2003]

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I quoted Dawkins' as saying that the information in the cells is about how to survive.

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Dawkins, respectfully, has a tendency to anthropomorphize chemistry.

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If this information is how to survive, does that mean that the species instinctively wants to continue surviving?

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The 'information' in DNA isn't about how to survive. It isn't about anything, any more than any other molecule is 'about' the chemical reactions/combinations it undergoes or can undergo. DNA isn't trying to survive. It survives as a side effect of what it does-- react with other chemicals. Its survival is de facto, not intentional. It is wrong to ascribe volition to molecules.To more directly answer the question, the species doesn't give a crap about surviving. The species is not a thing cabable of caring. 'Species' is not a thing at all. It is an abstraction. We talk about species as if they were things in just the way that the law in the US treats corporation as if they were people.

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Natural selection is essentially a struggle for existence.

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Again, not really. NS is a label we put on a process. Some animals reproduce more successfully than others, for various reasons, but it is not teleological. Animals don't struggle to survive, they just do what they do. Survival is a side effect. The appearance of struggle is an abstraction. Think of a river flowing through a rocky canyon. The water is whipped into rapids, eddies, etc. It appears to be struggling through the canyon, but it isn't. There is no real attempt to do anything. The water just obeys the forces pressing on it.

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Individual organisms compete to survive to produce more. If they meet this objective, this instict, does that mean that they have met what they were intended to do (by their internal instincts of course), or their purpose? It seems that way to me.

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No. Because there is no intent.

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Your example of water turning into ice is irrelevant. This is because that the water simply follows its' inherent chemical properties.

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This is exactly why the example is relevant. Show me a strand of DNA that does something other than follow its inhernet chemical properties.

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However, there is no tendency for random chemicals to align themselves in such a way to produce life.

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Of course not. Chemistry isn't teleological. Chemicals don't try to get from anywhere to anywhere. Chemicals just react.

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You cannot compare apples and oranges.

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I'm not. DNA is a molecule. It behaves like any other molecule. Where does DNA not follow basic chemical laws?

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In fact, chemical equilibrium would most likely be the result of random chemical reactions instead of first life.

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Only in the absence of an energy supply.

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**If you are wondering about chemical equilibrium, Chuck Missler and Mark Eastman state (at Page not found):

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If I were interested in chemical equilibrium I'd look for a real source.

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Nope. The instincts inside the organism push the organism to survive and reproduce.

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You are missing the point. If we look at results, and infer a motive based on the results, then we must consider the most common result-- extinction. That is the flaw in the approach. You can pick one result. I can pick another, and frankly, mine is the better choice.An organisms instinct are irrelevant when trying to infer from results. It is a different line of reasoning altogether.

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If they did not survive, it is not because they did not want to (except in the case of humans), but because they were inefficient in the environment.

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Yes, but you are still applying volition inappropriately. The argument sounds pretty good when animals like mammals. But it becomes less convincing when talking about insects. Much less convincing when discussing bacteria. And kinda silly when the subject is a virus. Do you claim a virus 'wants' to survive? It 'want to' even though it has no brain, or even any organs at all.

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This instinct is a product of the DNA.

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Do viruses have instincts? Or do the molecules just do what they do? You should really consider cleaning up your terminology.

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DNA is the result of all the lower information levels.

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This is begging the question. And circular.If you take a strand of DNA and parse it to find syntax, etc. you can't turn around and say these things caused to DNA. If you parse a line of code to find syntax, you can't infer that the syntax caused the code.

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The DNA does produce instincts to survive and reproduce.

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It is irrelevant. My computer produces heat. I cannot infer that it is supposed to produce heat, noise, and electric bills. Likewise, DNA reacts with other chemicals and produces a myriad of effects, but you cannot infer that these effects are its raison d'etre.

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If an organism meets the goal originally produced by the DNA that was manifested as an instinct, then it has solved its' "equation".

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But you haven't told me the equation. Dealing strictly with DNA, what is the equation it is supposed to solve?

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However even if I agree and say that it impossible to know the original purpose of the DNA, you cannot give me a naturally occuring code/information system to justify your claims.

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What? What claim? An example of what, exactly?

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You still cannot give me an accurate counterexample.

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... of what?

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Similarly, we may not see the designer of the DNA, but we can infer from the processes that go on in the DNA that life was the goal.

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No we can't, for reasons I've already stated.

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Information is nonmaterial.

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That is not a problem. Any access to information we have is material and we'd recognize the technology.

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For example, we may find a new archaeological artifact that we have never seen before, and one that no one had ever thought of making before it was found (except by the creator). We had no idea what the creator was thinking, therefore we didn't know that a human built it.

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I'd say there would be a pretty good chance that we wouldn't recognize it as having been built, unless or until people started noticing things like tool marks or materials that do not occur in nature. Thus, we would, if we recognized it at all, recognize it by analyzing patterns.

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By pattern recognition, you mean specified complexity.

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Do I?

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This could be an arrow head, a stone statue, etc.. It also must be aperiodic and must be very complex.

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Wrong. Suprisingly convincing arrowheads can be made by pouring water over hot flint. These are just as complex-- more so, probably-- than hand-made arrowheads.The first stone tools known are so simple that it hard to tell them from ordinary rocks. They are distinguished by repetitive patterns, not by any high level of complexity. [quote]The DNA possesses all of these qualities.[quote] What qualities? It is not periodic, and it is very complex? So is a pile of sand. The most complex things are entirely random.

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Why then do you say that it is not the product of intelligence.

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Because the inference is invalid.

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SETI uses the requirement of specified complexity.

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No it doesn't. SETI uses pattern recognition. SETI is a search for recognizable patterns in space noise. The most complicated thing is the noise itself.

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The substance that the information is conveyed upon is irrelevant-information is not a property of matter.

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It is with DNA. The 'information' and the chemistry are one and the same. You can't alter the chemicals without altering the information. Nor can you change the medium and have the DNA function. It is not like copying from hard drive to cd.

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The same message can be expressed in several different ways using various different physical carriers.

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Not with DNA. You cannot seperate the 'information' from the medium.

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The only way to tell design then is specified complexity.

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It doesn't work. Random is very complex.

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1. You only use one of Gitt's definitions for apobetics. He also defines apobetics as the result

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Wrong. I didn't use any of Gitt's definitions. Gitt is a git.

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2. Instincts push an organism to perform a certain act.

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I have dealt with this objection.

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3. Even if we threw out apobetics as a requirement for the ability to recognize a code in the Gitt sense, you could not provide any counterexample with syntax, semantics, representational function, etc.

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Still don't know what you want with this one.

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4. The origin of the DNA is not due to its' inherent physi-chemical properties, like water turning into ice. Rather the relationship has to be imposed upon matter. The relationship should be like the relationship between words and letters on a page. Books do not write themselves.

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Your first two sentences are an assumption. In fact, they are a statement of what you wish to prove, so they can't also be an objection.The next two sentences constitute a straw man. Words, books, letters, etc. do not react with their environments in the way that molecules do.

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5. We have already determined that the material carrier of information is not information in itself.

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We determined that did we? I'd say that information is an abstraction and not really a thing at all.

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To construct the DNA in the primordial seas an organization mechanism must have been present.

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Chemicals organize without the aid of any mechanism beyond their own chemical properties. Crystals, for example.

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Your argument would be like saying that random chemical reactions between iron oxide and plastic can produce a formatted floppy disk.

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This would be a straw man for the sames reasons that the book example was a straw man.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com[This message has been edited by John, 09-07-2003]

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I would be more inclined to believe a world class zoologist than some guy I met on the internet.

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This is a fallacy known as an appeal to authority. The problem is that it doesn't matter who said what. What matters is the argument.

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I do not mean this to be offensive; you are clearly a very intelligent fellow.

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It is. You may not realize this but you are also jsut some guy on the internet. Perhaps I'll refuse to take your ideas seriously for that reason and that alone? Sound like a good plan?

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However I believe Dawkins' and "The Genetic Book of the Dead" (this was a chapter in one of his books dealing with information in the DNA and what it is about).

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"The genetic book of the dead" is chapter ten in "Unweaving the Rainbow."Why do you talk about who you believe, rather than what and why you believe?

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This still does not clear up the issue that no code in the Gitt sense has been shown to occur naturally. I have failed to see one counter example to Gitt's notion that codes only come about through intelligence.

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Hang on, now. I knew something was wrong with this objection but I had to read through it a few times and crawl into bed for it to hit me. If you allow what you allowed just previously... ... then you can no longer claim that DNA fits Gitt's definitions. Allowing that we cannot know whether DNA was created for a purpose, means that we cannot know that it meets Gitt's fifth element-- apobetics.In fact, it seems to me that this consideration will make any argument fatally circular. If these five elements are necessary conditions for identifying information, then you need external support for each of the five elements. You can't infer from some to all. Checkmate.

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See? the physio-chemical properties has little to nothing to do with the organization of the DNA, whereas this is all that is involved in tree rings.

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No. I don't see. The bonds between the atoms of DNA follow the same rules as any other molecule.

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No one reads a book and wonders "Wow! I wonder where I can a bottle of that ink. This was such a good book." Similarly we cannot give the ink (DNA base codes) and paper (proteins) credit for composing the code.

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DNA is not remotely like ink on paper.

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Please do not confuse the material carrier of information with the information itself.

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You are talking about one and the same thing with a DNA molecule. It is more like a clock than a computer. The springs and gears are material to the information it carries-- a measure of time. You cannot print it to paper or you destroy the information-- the clock won't work. Likewise, you can't copy DNA to any other molecule and have it do the same thing the original does. You cannot replace the atoms and have it work.

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Refer to my above quotes from Yockey, etc..

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You've not answered the question. What does DNA do that does not conform to normal everday rules of chemistry? You repeatedly claim that DNA is special, yet you cannot tell what it does that is special?

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The material carrier (the DNA molecule) obeys chemical laws and has a very organized structure.

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Are you joking? DNA is a mess.

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Even if there were long strands of DNA molecules, that would be the equivalent of many blank floppy disks floating around in the ocean.

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The floppy disk analogy is so bad it makes me weep. I believe the problems have been pointed out to you.

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What are you refering to here? Do you propose a mechanism like that of Prigogine's? If so, then there are many holes in it. Harvard scientist Dr. John Ross (not a creationist) affirms:

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Why are you quoting something about violating the second law? I said nothing about violating the second law. With an energy supply, you can have local increases of complexity. Without an energy supply, the system winds down until it reaches equilibrium. Nothing here violates the second law.This John Ross wouldn't be the lawyer would he?

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Bacteria do follow their natural need to reproduce.

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That's just it. Do bacteria need? Do viruses need? Like I said, it is an improper application of the idea of voliton.

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So what do molecules "actually do".

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React with other atoms and molecules according to some basic rules, all of which have to do with very physical and natural forces. What do you think they do?

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The DNA in bacteria is designed to reproduce to keep life going.

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Begging the question.

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The computer must produce heat to perform other required tasks. This is just like a gar that must use gasoline to run.

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The two are very different. The analogy is terrible.

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The information in the DNA is used for survival regardless of whether it meant to or not.

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That is exactly right. This, however, cuts the legs right out from under you. You can't infer design from here.

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So, what are the characteristics of these patterns that makes us classify them as resulting from intelligence?

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Did I not just answer that? We recognize the results of our own behavior. We know what stone tools do the bone. We know what teeth do to bone. The marks on a bone look like stone tool marks so we conclude that they were made by a human and, by extension, by an intelligent being. SETI was similar, but with math. We know what patterns our mathematics produce, etc.

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In relation to this, let's say that a different type of chemistry was used in the origin of life event, with different rules and laws. Life could indeed be created and expressed using this new chemistry, just like I could convey the same message using paper and ink, sound waves, writing in the sand, etc..

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You have got to be joking? Imagining an imaginary chemistry with imaginary laws is your response? The fact is that you would have to imagine the exact same chemistry that we have now in order to get the SAME information in the molecule. That is because the molecular bonds cannot be ignored. They are part and parcel of the molecule. You could get a DIFFERENT life, perhaps, but that is not the same information is it?

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Then I guess by your standards we couldn't separate the information in a book from the paper and ink.

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The book analogy is ridiculous. Manipulating ink on paper is nothing like manipulating the structure of a DNA molecule.

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Could life be expressed using other amino acids?

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Sure, but that isn't the point is it? The correct question should be "Can one get the same reactions-- the same information-- with other amino acids?" Not likely.I really have no idea what the point was of the lengthy Contact discourse.

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And computer programs don't react the same way as books. We could go on and on.

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But you miss the importance of it. You can put ink on paper in any configuration you choose, because all the ink sticks to all the bits of paper equally. All the bits of DNA do not stick to all other bits equally. That is a big difference.

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Is it really so different?

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The researcher says the TREATMENT is identical. He is not trying to infer design. That is a very big difference. You, however, are trying to infer design.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Lol... give me a few months and I don't understand my own code, and I write simple stuff-- nothing professional.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com