Re: [Fis] molecular discussion

Dear colleagues,

Luis and Shu-Kun responses to Xerman were relating information and entropy,
and 'exergy' (or usable work---the first time this concept appears in our
discussions). I think it is a very good idea relating the management of
'exergy' in the cell with the contemporary engineering approaches to
'thermoeconomics'. And that one, again, is a new, strange term; it attempts
a bridge between the universe of physics and the universe of human monetary
information. Other 'bridges' have appeared in very recent exchanges: sets
and group theory, chemistry & maths, sets & words (thesaurus)... In this
labyrinth of bridges (as most of them are interconnected), it seems that
those between physics and information attract permanently our attention,
like a magnet. Seemingly, the field of studies of 'information physics'
would be crucial to solve our global conundrum about info.

Really? I was trying to locate in our fis web-archive those 10 points that
Igor proposed us, around 5 years ago, as sort of foundations for
'information physics'. It would be interesting to re-read them and compare
with the new avenues now proposed (can anyone locate that old
message--unfortunately it is missing in our archives). The idea I would
like to relate with all these old and new messages is that the whole world
of 'molecular recognition' phenomena that occur in the cell, represent a
universal solution to a tough problem of mechanics: the relationship with
the boundary conditions.

The non living just follows its boundary conditions (and interacts with),
as its 'charge' parameters (mass included) call into action the
corresponding natural laws or forces. But the living system, as a whole,
does something else: it manages to explore its boundary conditions and
literally exploits them (enacting its own living). Then? I think that this
strange capability (to which we label rather confusingly with several ad
hoc terms such as sensibility, purpose, adaptation, evolution, etc.) might
be best caught globally by the concept of 'abduction'. So, contrary to the
inanimate, the animate has a funny informational organization based on a
myriad of molecular recognition events that handle, accumulate, transfer,
etc., the whole 'knowledge' about abducing the boundary conditions of the
system. My view is that the very biomolecules crucially in charge of
controlling the system (enzymes) contain in their structure an 'impressed
mark' about the abductive dynamics they support.

When the founding fathers of molecular biology --all of them staunchest
reductionists-- advanced their new science in the 50's and 60's, they
intuitively crafted their concepts out from the information metaphor: code,
expression, transcription, translation, signals, messages, messengers, etc.
(why not from forces and mechanics???) Well, they did not much care about
making sense of these subtle theoretical problems that are now plaguing,
for instance, the bioinformatic crew. Perhaps these problems systematically
reappear, under different guises, in other 'informational disciplines' such
as neuroscience, psychology, economics ('thermoeconomics' included), social
sciences, etc. Maybe the infamous breach between the natural sciences and
the humanities is nothing but the information gap.

I am much enjoying the elegant postings of these days.

best

Pedro

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Received on Fri Jul 4 15:03:42 2003