Re: DNA and Information

On Jul 7, 6:52 am, rick_so...@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
On Jul 7, 6:29 am, rick_so...@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:



On Jul 7, 6:07 am, "Perplexed in Peoria" <jimmene...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

<rick_so...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in messagenews:1183783986.548146.21010@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On Jul 6, 6:39 pm, Dwib <dwibd...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jul 5, 1:45 pm, Desertphile <desertph...@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Hi. Does DNA contain information? I have been trying to find a
"Yes" web page, but so far I have found "No, not really" web
pages. If DNA does have information, how is that information
defined?

And thank you for any help one may wish to offer me on this topic.
:-)

The very fact that that, to write out DNA code, you need to write a
bunch of AGCTs "in a particular order" MEANS there is a ton of
"information" in DNA.

Dwib

And thats my point about it being digitally encoded information.

Usually, the phrase 'digitally encoded' suggests that there is analog
information there, but it is being represented digitally. It is
difficult to see how this applies to DNA. In any case, there is
no process of digitally encoding, even if you can identify some
cases (e.g. consensus sequences in transcription start sites) in
which it might be said that digital data is decoded to an analog
signal.

Well AGCT in a particular order is no different than morse code is a
form of digitally encoded text.

Consider for one second the process.
As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself,
and when it fills that opportunity it creates another opportunity
specific to another atom.
Now its true that Deuterium, can take the place of a Hydrogen atom,
and things will still work, they just won't work as well.
So now then the Deuterium atom, has filled the slot of the Hydrogen
atom and guess what?
Thats a different analog configuration.
Yet the information is preserved.
It is preserved because the information is digitally encoded in the
design of the molecule.

Now consider also, what sort of chain reaction we are talking about
here, when proteins within a cell, are also part of that same chain
reaction.

And the recycling of proteins, and the shape of proteins as they are
bent and all those thinsg those amazing myriad of processes in the
human body, where chemicals are made and energy used, and waste given
off, and things are recycled, can you imagine just how amazingly
complex that all is on the molecular level?

To make one protein, to make one protein, come together by itself,
just one protein, and there are a million in the human body, doing 50
billion specific tasks, but to make just one protein, you need to have
1,020 amino acids, molecules, come together
in a specific exact order. So the chances of that are easy to compute.

How many wrong ways are there, that 1020 molecules could come
together, before it came together the right way?

You take one piece, and you try to fit it by taking each of the 1020
pieces, to see which one fits, and then you do that 1020 times, for
each 1020 pieces.

Except well it is not like only one piece fits, they all fit, you just
have to hit on that magic combination, that will make that a protein
when you are done, and you must know you are done, so you don't add
just one more piece.
Scum filled pond indeed.

Consider an analogy, where you have 1020 different letters in a very
big alphabet. (Ours has 26 letters)

Now you can make words and you can write sentences with all those
letters, and some of the words you make by shaking those letters in a
hat, will be recognizable as words if you dump the hat on the floor.
But what is the chance, that if you dump that hat on the floor, all
those letters, will line up in perfect order, and spell out a
meaningful sentence, and not just any meaningful sentence, but a
sentence that is an important sentence to a book, that has a million
sentences, and each sentence, is a set of instructions, telling the
other things, to do 5,000 exact things in order.

Well you can dump that hat on the ground forever, and it will never
spell one complete meaningful sentence in order, that is the right
sentence, out of all the possible sentences you could create with all
those letters.
Keeping in mind, the English language has only 26 letters and we have
dictionaries a foot thick.

And thats just one tiny piece of the puzzle. One protein, of a
million, a million different proteins in the human body, that all have
to spell out an exact sentence.

Another analogy,
you pull the handle of the slot machine, and you are looking for 1020
cherries to win the prize.
How many times would you have to pull that handle to get all those
cherries to line up?
Longer than the universe has existed.

And further, you aren't getting away with making just one protein
either.

You have to do that a million times, for each of the proteins, until
you have the proteins organized for life.

I suppose you could argue well even if the odds of it happening are 1
with a billion zeros after it, it happened.

And if you bet on those odds well you will never win.

And that is why, the people who actually determined that the shape of
DNA was a double helix, and won the Nobel prize, said that life, was
probably seeded, by extraterrestrials, simply because the universe as
we know it, is not old enough, for this to ever happen, by itself.

Also one strand of DNA can be 12 cm in length.
An atom is one angstrom wide.
And there are 100,000,000 angstroms in a centimeter.

so 1,200,000,000 atoms in a chain.

so stretch out your scrabble letters, from here to the moon, and be
sure to arrange them, AGCT, in a meaningful, encoded message, which
translates into instructions, and Bob's your uncle. You have made your
first step, of a 100 billion billion such steps, towards creating a
living bacteria.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: DNA and Information
    ... If DNA does have information, ... As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself, ... (Ours has 26 letters) ... Longer than the universe has existed. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: DNA and Information
    ... If DNA does have information, ... As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself, ... To make one protein, to make one protein, come together by itself, ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: DNA and Information
    ... If DNA does have information, ... As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself, ... To make one protein, to make one protein, come together by itself, ... where you have 1020 different letters in a very ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: DNA and Information
    ... As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself, ... billion specific tasks, but to make just one protein, you need to have ... where you have 1020 different letters in a very ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: DNA and Information
    ... As DNA replicates, an opportunity for a atom to fit presents itself, ... billion specific tasks, but to make just one protein, you need to have ... (Ours has 26 letters) ... Its unbelievably complex on the molecular level. ...
    (talk.origins)
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