Is there really information being conveyed within a cell?

[theaz101]

@Puck_Mendelssohn

@theaz101

Digital information isn’t just a concept. We use it all the time to perform functions. We can design things like the internet and this forum which lets us communicate with each other. And digital information is what’s being used in living organisms to produce the machinery that life is based on, no matter how much denialism that you throw at it.

No, none of that suggests that digital “information” is a thing in and of itself. Rather, it suggests that digital information is an explanatory construct of sorts, useful to humans for the purpose of characterizing the behavior of complex things and for communicating. It’s not good to mistake explanations for facts. It is, in fact, literally just chemistry which you’re characterizing here.

By that standard, I suppose you think that the computer you use is just a result of “electronics”?

@Puck_Mendelssohn

Cute use of the word “denialism” here. Do you think it fools anyone?

Not intended to fool anyone. It’s quite accurate.

@Puck_Mendelssohn

@theaz101

Coming from the other side, I’m baffled that anyone who understands (even at a layman’s level) the processes of transcription/translation/replication of DNA can say “a-yup, it’s just chemistry”.

So, what aspect of it is not chemistry? Have you discovered some part of those processes which does not obey chemical principles? If so, you haven’t mentioned it.

Concerning your bafflement: the fact that you aren’t able to actually express WHY you think that these phenomena require an intelligence frankly suggests that you haven’t bothered to think about it much. Inability to plainly and coherently express an idea often is caused by that sort of underlying failure of thought. Since biologists as a rule do NOT accept what you appear to think is intuitively obvious, it’s fair to say that you will convince nobody who does not share your own particular prejudices and misconceptions in the matter. If you want to persuade the biological community that the genetic code can only be the product of an intelligent mind, you’ll have to actually be able to express WHY you think that, not just your incredulity at others disagreeing with you.

I believe that I’ve already said why. It’s because life depends on the tens of thousands of different protein functions that we found happening in the cell. These functions are determined by the sequence of the amino acids (the functions are carried out chemically) that comprise the protein. The sequence of the amino acids ultimately come from the sequence of the DNA nucleotides in the gene for that protein.

I believe that it took an intelligent mind to put the DNA nucleotides in the right sequences to form the necessary proteins and functional rna to result in life, just as I believe that it requires intelligent minds to group various letters of the English alphabet together into the words and sentences of the posts of the forum.

@Puck_Mendelssohn

@Giltil

Premise 1: a code requires a coder

It’s clear from other discussion that you believe that the word “coder” here means an intelligent agent. If so, the non sequitur is embedded in your premises, so that even if the syllogism were correctly constructed internally, it is fatally flawed because its premises are false.

And this gets back to what seems to be the core problem with you. You think that an absence of evidence for your astonishing claims can somehow be made up for by a surplus of “argument.” It really doesn’t work that way, on questions of fact. This isn’t some sort of obscure philosophical exercise. There is no form of words, no strange characterization of the facts, no rephrasing of your non sequiturs, which turns your lack of evidence into a compelling case. You need to stop focusing on “argument” entirely and ask yourself how one might actually demonstrate – with EVIDENCE, not argument – such things as the existence of your designer and its behavior in constructing the things you allege it constructed.

Isn’t the “absence of evidence” of a creator/designer central to your argument?