Pigliucci Challenges Randomness (Religion)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Wednesday, January 20, 2010, 20:18 (5202 days ago) @ David Turell


> > If we're talking life as we know it, there are about 60 "words" in the entire language, and thus the complexity of life hinges on the length of the piece, in which case, the words code for proteins of varying sizes. 
> > 
> > How intelligent can you be if you can only communicate yourself with 60 words? (and many of them mean the same thing?) In human terms we'd either call you a 1 yr old or mentally challenged. Of course, this is looking at life as it is now, and not when it got started.
> 
> These comments entirely miss the point of living biochemistry. Sure the 60 codons translate into 20 amino acids, but biochemical protein molecules are more than just strings of amino acids. Folding creates different functions. Enzymes are enormous molecules with keyed areas to hold the molecular actions they helping to succeed. Histones help control DNA, etc. It is not just 20 left-handed amino acids (and why only left-handed?). It is a highly complex interplay of very carefully fashioned molecules. Often one action is coordinated by a large company of different molecules in a succession of events. 
> 
> Watson and Crick thought their code was the beginning and the end point. Far from it, understanding DNA just opened a Pandora's box of almost infinite complexity.-Proteins fold in many different ways--but these ways are predictable and is a source of ongoing scientific effort. It is the cutting edge of bioinformatics and is the type of work being conducted here at UNO in order to build a better computer model. Computational simulations of biochemistry will be the greatest push for biology into the next 100 years, and the amount of knowledge we'll gain after quantum computing will be exponential. -It is important to note that it IS at the organic and chemical level where deterministic properties exist. -The harder part to argue from a design perspective, is how a completely undetectable force can influence anything in the physical universe. It isn't enough to rely on chance figures--though I didn't throw away the general formula I was building to help a person judge the validity of chance, and it does include the information processing theorem that will judge time at the quantum level.

--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"