Arne Kjellman wrote:
"... And as I have told you before - unless you can resolve the
REALIST'S DILEMMA I can see no sound reason for me converting to
realism - and neither for you being one, no matter how many mantras
you are able to produce."
Arne, I think you are hopelessly sinking into experiential quicksand
on this issue of "reality." It is entirely too easy, indeed
gratuitous, to say that no reality could not possibly exist because
it is OUT THERE and we are IN HERE. You may as well attack the
experiential individual's need for a symbolic language, which puts
him even further into that quicksand. But, in the face of this dire
situation, we fortunately have science to lift us from that
threatening swamp of experiential primacy. Without science, we sink
subjectively, don't we? Without an objective reality we would have
to resort to those experiential shadows on the wall that go back to
Plato's cave and beyond.
Stan Salthe wrote:
"... The most reasonable model of Life's origin at present seems to
me to be that liquid crystalline micelles gave rise to some kind of
proteinid microspheres, and -- here is the problem these somehow came
to acquire what we know as the genetic system."
Stan, this is close to the rub I perceive, which concerns the
emergence or adoption or implantation or miraculous insertion, you
name it, of a digital language with a symbolic dictionary that can be
stored and communicated by cells in a linear format we come to
recognize as genetic information. I cannot even tacitly assume that
those analogous crystalline micelles somehow had the organizational
ability to evolve a digital (non-analogous) language to communicate
the "instructions for life." By what principle? This requires
analog-to-digital transcription�a big no-no for neo-Darwinian
modelers. The only principle I know of that ever allowed this to
naturally occur also stipulates that value-added requirement of
humans consciousness. Any model of the origin of genetic
"instructions for life" leaves a big black box where that apparently
marvelous adaptation occurred. And I don't know how invoking a
hierarchical schema will get me where I think I to need to go. Seems
to me that too many things run parallel without adequate consideration.
Karl Javorszky wrote:
"... But please let
me keep the chance to maintain the belief that the model - compelling
to me
- that our logic has heretofore not been sufficiently complex to
describe
the most basic method of densifying information, namely that of
writing and
rewriting it from a sequence into a commutative assembly and back, by
employing symbols that individuate in differing extents. ...
So, there are quite many and well-founded arguments for assuming that
indeed
there appears to exist a logical answer to the great question of natural
science, how genetics functions, and that this is a model to which
reasonable and sober people can say this is a convincing, say compelling
model.
Thank you for the opportunity to advertise the
sequential-commutative-sequential mantra, which is identical to the
similar-diverse-similar mantra. "
Karl, this is interesting to me. Maybe the principle I seek is your
"sequential-commutative-sequential mantra." I'm sure you know that
it is not friendly to Crick's central dogma, but that may not mean it
is necessarily wrong. Just exactly how this principle is implemented
by a "liquid-crystalline micelle" (Stan) is not made clear to me by
invoking the S-C-S mantra. It merely says that genetic information
can be written and rewritten. But how? By natural selection or
random genetic drift? Maybe. But this does not explain the origin of
a coded genetic language.
Best regards to all,
Richard
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Received on Wed Nov 8 18:45:08 2006
