Biological complexity: misfolded protein problems (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, September 06, 2017, 13:26 (2635 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID’s comment: Not only is the biology of the cell highly complex, it carries protections against mistakes. The normal processes and the protection for mistakes both had to be started at the same time. Since mistakes would be anticipated to occur, this implies planning and design for the entire systems. Chance attempts will not work.

dhw: One might ask why your all-powerful designer would create a system that keeps making mistakes but also creates methods of dealing with the mistakes, although these methods frequently fail (all organisms die). It might make sense, however, if we imagine him creating a system in which the components work independently in a grand free-for-all that applies just as much to the living microworld as it does to the living macroworld. To put it more directly: he might have created the first cells with an autonomous mechanism that would provide its own infinite variety of organisms (micro and macro) doing their own thing, i.e. making their own mistakes and corrections.

DAVID: Cell reproduction is at high speed. Mistakes occur. We see the protections for mistake discovery are in place. You want to cells to invent their own protection while working at high speed. A day dream. It all had to be place at the start.

Again I wonder why an all-powerful designer, who is always in control, would design a system that makes mistakes. This doesn’t strike you as strange? Do you think he was incapable of designing a system without mistakes? If not, maybe he wanted it to make mistakes, but gave it the potential ability to put things right. ("Potential" because lots and lots of things go wrong and are not put right.) That would fit in very nicely with the history of evolution. Or do you think he was incapable of designing a system potentially enabling organisms to put things right?