Information as the source of life; not by chance II (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, January 23, 2020, 18:49 (1554 days ago) @ dhw

dhw:I am going to do some summarizing before answering David. The subject becomes a total mess without definitions see below). My post focused initially on this extraordinary generalization:

QUOTE: "My main postulate is that information is strictly tied to an idea, a product, or a message. I cannot see how it is possible to have information prior to the idea, product, or message because information is an abstract representation of those things. How can an abstract representation exist prior to the phenomenon which it represents?”

dhw: I pointed out that information is present in all things and existed long before we came along to extrapolate “abstract representations” from them, i.e. the words that identify all the facts, details, characteristics, properties etc. of the material concerned. Information is totally passive and creates nothing. It takes a mind to analyse, process and use it. But I also bolded the obvious fact that intelligent minds can create information. David wishes to confine the discussion to DNA, and has therefore totally ignored all of the above. I object to the title of this thread because inert information cannot possibly be the source of life.

DAVID: You should edit a bit better. The word 'source' is the key to my meaning in the headline. we all use sourced material to help us developing n idea or a process. DNA is a 'source' for the creation of life and it contains the information to create a translating mechanism to read the DNA. You are picking on a headline to confuse the debate.

dhw: The headline causes as much confusion as the woolly manner in which the word “information” is bandied about. Of course DNA contains the information which is the “key” to life. And I have no problem with the logic behind the argument that this information is so complex that it must have been designed by an intelligent mind. Your argument is NOT that information is the source of life. Your argument is that your God is the source that created the information contained in DNA. Bizarrely, you have said precisely this yourself, and yet you think you are contradicting me:

DAVID: […] The inert information in DNA has to have a source that created it. How did the information in the coded DNA get there? It had to be created in some way. The point of the original article, we are discussing, claimed it required mental activity by a mind.

dhw: Yes, a theist can take DNA as an example parallel to the human mind creating the information in a railway timetable, the laws of cricket and a lollipop. But firstly that does not mean all information must be created by an intelligent mind! This generalization is used as an attempt to prove the existence of God, and it doesn’t work. Although your belief that the complexity of the information in DNA requires an intelligent designer is perfectly logical, you need faith to believe in such a being. An atheist can argue that the information for life was always present in the materials of which it is composed (NB again: it is absurd to argue that all information has to be created by a mind), and these were assembled by chance – and not created and assembled by an intelligent mind. But again you need faith to believe in such a hypothesis.

DAVID: You are fighting that meaning with confusion over the meaning of a headline. Why does the discussion of the source of the information underlying life frighten you so much? We both know it had to be created or life would not exist.

dhw: It is the source of the information that is the source of life, and I am not in the least bit frightened – I am the one trying to bring sense to the discussion. You believe the source of the information is an intelligent mind which was always simply “there”; an atheist can argue that the information was always simply “there”. You complained that I should edit a bit better. My complaint is that the headline is misleading, and you and the author of the article should define your terms before you embark on a needlessly convoluted and misleading argument to justify your beliefs.

Instead of entering the back and forth above, one simple statement fits the issue of information. There is descriptive information which a mind can describe, and there is instructional information which can initiate a process like life itself. DNA contains that information and it must come from mental activity, especially because of the enormous complexity of the process of life.