Information as the source of life; semiotics afterthought (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, November 30, 2015, 18:47 (3069 days ago) @ David Turell

I fell into this article on semiotics in cells and thought it would contribute to our discussion. Basically DNA is a code of signs and must be interpreted by the cell, since the cell conducts its processes according to the instructions in DNA and its modifying layersefinition of semiotics:-http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/semiotics-Article:-http://complexitycafe.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=30:irreducible-complexity-the-primordial-condition-of-biology-2&catid=10&Itemid=101-"But the fact remains that semiosis is a process that simply does not occur without (a minimum of) two objects operating in a very specific system. And the function that is lost by not having this system is the very capacity to organize biology in the first place. The living cell does not happen without it.-"Semiosis ultimately refers to the physical process whereby meaningful information is exchanged and translated in the living kingdom. The translation of an informational medium is a primordial condition of biology because it creates the physical means to specify objects and place them under temporal control. This is a universal reality inside the living cell. The capacity to specify something is the utility that enables living things to be organized in a far-from-equilibrium state, and sustains them there. But the capacity to specify something is itself a product of organization -- a unique organization unlike any other. It has clear organizational requirements that must be fulfilled in order to function.-"Foremost, it requires the arrangement of a medium to serve as a representation - an object that is foreign to all other (non-semiotic) physical systems. This arrangement is used to specify the thing being represented within the system, but no material object (regardless of its arrangement) inherently specifies or represents any other material object, so a second arrangement of matter is required to establish what is being specified by the representation. This is a fundamental organizational requirement involving two critical objects, and is required to accomplish what the system can do. It is this architecture that allows nucleic representations to specify amino acid effects in a deterministic material system. But there is a third critical requirement -- the system only functions by establishing the medium as a genuine formal representation. This is accomplished by preserving the natural discontinuity between the arrangement of the representation and the determination of its effect. In the origin of the autonomous self-replicating cell, many of these representational relationships must simultaneously exist in order to have the informational capacity to record itself into memory, and begin the cycle of life. This also implies the additional requirements that the patterns of these individual representations be independent of their dynamic properties, and that the constraints of a reading frame code be instantiated in the system and recorded in the information encoded by it."-Comment: Obviously there must be an intelligently designed decoder, or onboard intelligence to follow the instructions. All we know now is the DNA instructions are used and followed appropriately or there would be no life.