That’s junk DNA.
Crick’s hypothesis is true. Information as present in DNA is passed on to RNA to protein (this is biology so of course there are exceptions). What is not true is that the sequence is primary or the material is secondary. Crick never said that, and the chemistry, physics, and structure involved was of great interest to him, so his hypothesis does not support your contention.
Agreed, it functions as part of a biochemical process.
For any given subsequent generation of organisms, the distribution of change is small.
I’m missing the why. You state a number of facts, none of which imply a creator at all.
Please complete your argument, so far you seem to have only stated a few premises none of which entail (or make likely) the conclusion you claim to derive from them.
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By phylogenetic inference, since the machinery for DNA replication is not universally conserved (is different in bacteria vs archaea, often taken to imply that the DNA replication machineries in both domains evolved after the split of the bacterial and archaeal lineages from the last universal common ancestor), and since de novo DNA biosynthesis are elaborations on the pathways for de novo RNA biosynthesis (basically, that cells that synthesize the monomers of DNA first synthesize the monomers of RNA and then further modify them), yes, in fact there is evidence that implies that RNA preceded DNA in evolution.
No, not entirely like a modern translation system. But why would it have to? There is some evidence that the core RNA component of the ribosome can actually catalyze peptide bond formation in the complete absence of protein.
4 posts were split to a new topic: Side Comments: Is there really information being conveyed within a cell?
@Rumraket
@theaz101 is not required to justify belief in a divine Creator. It’s OK to discuss so long as both parties agree.
Comment related to physical entropy will soon be split to a side thread. Possibly comments related to data storage as well, unless some particular relevance develops.
He is stating reasons “why he infers” a creator, then gives a list of reasons that do not imply that. I’m not sure what I’m being asked to do here. Should I just plain ignore that the reasons he gives do not, in fact, imply the conclusion he states?
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I can’t call this a hard and fast rule, but this is how I see it:
We can acknowledge a person’s reasons for belief without necessarily agreeing with them.
We should stop short of saying a person’s religious belief are wrong because we don’t accept their reasoning.
We can explain why we do not accept that reasoning.
We should not expect (or demand) logical reasoning for religious beliefs.
If @theaz101 wants to discuss his reasoning, that is OK. I think anyone willing to “put their beliefs on the line” in this way is due some respect.
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A post was merged into an existing topic: Side Comments: Is there really information being conveyed within a cell?
Why not? That’s absurd. Why is religious beliefs exempt from demands for making sense, being evidentially supported, or being logical or rational? What is this lunacy you are saying.
I think we should do both. But even if we didn’t, he is purporting to offer logical reasons for his beliefs. Why else would he state they are “reasons why he infers” it?
What is a reason why—taking the form of a list of empirical facts—but a purported logical reason for the belief?
I don’t have a problem with belief in a creator in general. What I have a problem with is claims to offer logical or science-based reasons for those beliefs that are in fact neither.
If he were to say “I believe in God because I believe in this particular interpretation of the Bible” I would say okay, fine. Done. Case closed. That is his belief and I have no problem with that. It’s when he lists empirical facts and offers them up as “reasons why” I start to have question.
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Sorry but as a religious believer myself I don’t understand the rationale here. @theaz101 gave a list of facts from which they infer the existence of a creator. It’s perfectly valid for Rum to ask how they infer the existence of a creator from those facts.
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First of all, I’m not prohibiting the discussion, just setting some guard rails for theaz101’s benefit. He’s still new here after all, and very much outnumbered.
Second, from the atheistic standpoint, religious beliefs aren’t going to make sense. Theology has it’s own sort of logic, which (IMO) cannot be completely sensible unless it is approached with a degree of faith.
It’s OK to have faith.
There is an opportunity here to establish Common Ground. You are unlikely to agree with him, but you might come to understand him better.
Great! Now it’s absolutely clear. The two of can (with consent) work out the points where you agree and where you don’t.
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Peter agrees with you, who said: but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect (Peter 3:15)
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Sure, but I think @Rumraket is right – the question here is not what one believes or why, but how, in terms of reason itself, one takes the view that certain observations lead to a particular inference. I am as baffled as he is as to how anyone could think that those observations would support such an inference, and this is one of those strange “black box” things where religious believers frequently look at something and say, “a-yup, there it is” when there’s nothing to say a-yup about.
I assume we are just dealing with the usual misconception that “information” is somehow an essence, with an existence independent of things, which constitutes the new elan vital. This misconception simply misses the fact that “information” is not a res itself, but merely a concept we use to characterize certain kinds of activity in the world. But if that’s not what’s happening here, and some explanation can be had as to how these facts are thought to support this inference, I’d be glad to hear it.
It seems to me that the inference is supported, or not; and that whether one is a religious believer or not has very little to do with whether one thinks it is.
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Yes. There are unstated assumptions behind the thinking. I’d guess it relates to the question of, “How did something this complicated come about?” That and making analogies with organisms and manufactured things like computers. And we don’t know how life started. Lots of hints and research possibilities but we’re a long way off from anything conclusive.
Evolution of life since then is on way stronger ground, particularly humans having ape ancestors.
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How do you know this? How hard have you looked? How did you look? Show your work, please.
If “I haven’t done the experiment” is the basis by which you infer a creator, I would suggest that the inference is vanishingly weak.
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I think there is further conceptual confusion at play. One could, if so inclined, think of “information” as something that exists as an abstract object, along with other things like numbers or the colour red. One could accept this premise and it still would not be sufficient to demonstrate that information can only be the result of the actions of an intelligent being. It would only establish that information is not a physical entity.
Hi Argon
I have been through this transition and the world looks very different depending on which side of the Creation vs Non Creation spectrum you currently hold. For instance once you think the evidence is strong enough to support Creation the world starts to look much different as, for example, a major road block in accepting the possibility of a human resurrection is no longer out of cognitive reach.
The next major road block that is removed is the possibility that the Creator has been communicating with us historically which is currently documented in the Bible. Once you take a serious look at the Bible, from a creation perspective, you realise there is reason to find it credible. Not as a history book but as source of understanding the relationship between the Creator and man which is part of a subject called Theology.
I think there is a general misconception that making your argument confused and confusing. I’ll try explain thru an analogy.
Think of a ball being dropped on the floor and bouncing back up. If we know enough about the physical attributes of the ball (the material it is made of, its size and weight, etc) and have the same sort of information about the floor, we can use the laws of physics to calculate how fast it will be moving when it hits the ground, how high it will bounce, how many times it will continue to bounce before coming to rest, etc.
However, we could ignore the ball and the floor, and instead, think only of the individual atoms that make them up. We could then ignore the fact that these are configured as a ball and a floor and, instead, calculate the interactions of all the individual atoms involved in the events in question. The entire series of events could be described at this level alone while ignoring the fact that these atoms constitute two larger objects (a ball and a floor). That is to say, the act of the ball falling to the ground and bouncing is made up of a very large number of events occurring at the atomic level, and could be completely reduced to these events alone.
Similarly, when you say the events involved in the transcription and translation from DNA to a functional protein involve more than just chemistry, that is not correct. These events can be reduced to the chemical interactions involved, just as the bouncing of the ball can be reduced to the interactions of the atoms constituting the ball and the floor. To say that the bouncing of the ball involves something more than these interactions of atoms is just as misconceived as your saying the formation of proteins from DNA involves more than just chemistry. In both cases, we can understand and conceive of the processes in terms of higher levels of organization (ball, floor, nucleotide sequence, protein, etc.) but that does not mean they cannot be fully reduced to the more fundamental level of organization. More importantly, it does not mean there are any other entities involved beyond the fundamental particles and forces acting on upon them, in either instance. The concepts of “ball”, “floor”, “nucleotide”, “protein”, “information”, etc. are just larger categories that we use to better comprehend what is going on.
Does that make sense?
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