More "miscellany" PART TWO (General)

by dhw, Friday, May 26, 2023, 08:28 (6 days ago) @ dhw

PART TWO

INFORMATION IS THE BASIS OF LIVING BIOLOGY

DAVID: Yes information is dormant until used. But information cannot appear de novo. A mind creates it and a mind or a mind-like cell interprets and uses it.

dhw: So when the wind blew the rock down on the man’s head and killed him, the masses of information contained in that incident were created by a mind, were they?

DAVID: Information is dormant until used is the answer, as in the accident your mind created.

You said that information cannot appear de novo. A mind creates it. In such an accident, there is no mind creating the information, which does not even exist until the accident happens. (The fact that I invented the example is totally irrelevant.) Yet more misleading and confusing use of the word!

dhw: What is your objection to the statement that biochemistry is the basis of living biology?

DAVID: Biochemistry, as a subject, is our understanding of how living biology works. We see it as a result of living cells using instructive information in their genomes.

dhw: Yes, biochemistry is a subject for study, but it's also the chemistry of living things, as in: Chemistry: bbb“the composition, properties and reactions of a particular substance”. (Encarta) Cells have to be alive before they can “use” information, so don’t you think the basis of life/living biology must be whatever composition, properties and reactions give them life?

DAVID: The 'composition, properties, reactions' all come from a DNA code, requiring a mind to design it and living cells to interpret it.

How does that make information the basis of living biology? Cells have to be alive before they can interpret information, so what makes them live?

DAVID: DNA, as a code, must be interpreted by cells or life doesn't happen. Remember first life appeared and has been producing life ever since.' How' is what we debate.

dhw: Please tell me how not-yet-living cells interpret the information in not-yet-living DNA, and this enables them to come to life. You know it’s nonsense, so stop dodging: there is no dispute over the fact that first life appeared and we still have life!

DAVID: Thank you. without that information cells don't produce life. That is why the appearance of life is a miracle. Everything happened all at once by design.

Without what information? Without the information that first life appeared, cells don’t produce life??? Yes, life is a miracle, and maybe everything happened all at once. How does that come to mean that information is the basis of living biology? The fact that you are being forced into all these non sequiturs should show you just what a pain these loose uses of the term “information” can cause.

Mudskippers

All dealt with on the “David’s theory” thread.

Madagascar

DAVID: God's purpose was to run evolution to finally produce humans while developing a very broad-based bush of life for human to eat and enjoy. […]
And
DAVID: […] The bush of life provides food for all.

dhw: How many more times are you going to use this obfuscation? The bush of life provided food for all the 99% of extinct life forms that had nothing to do with the life forms and food bushes you say were your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food). Hence your description of your God’s system as messy, cumbersome and inefficient.

DAVID: Yes, God evolved us as His choice of method.

And according to you he evolved (= specially designed) 99 out of 100 species that had no connection with us and no connection with our food, so please stop pretending that the whole bush of life was designed for humans.