(2024-04-16, 06:48 AM)sbu Wrote: [ -> ]No, biochemistry and biology are too far removed from my field. However, I do support science seriously contemplating the existence of irreducible phenomena, as this thread suggests.
Well strangely you don't really need to understand biochemistry or biology to explore this subject. Genes are basically digital - C, G, A, T. The chemistry of those four ingredients of DNA barely matters, they are simply labels. They act as a code (but I guess you must know that) so their chemistry is no more relevant than the voltage levels used within your computer to represent 0 and 1.
Although this DNA code is probably used in other ways, its primary use is to represent the linear string of amino acid bases that make up each different type of protein in a living system. The amino acids have names, but again these can usually be thought of simply as labels.
Think of a string of bytes in C, there has to be one byte which just represents the end of the string. In C that is a zero byte, in the genetic code the corresponding string terminator is TGA.
A strand of DNA contains thousands of genes (strings) and there can be gaps between the genes, therefore ATG acts as a start of gene marker if it is at the start of a gene, but otherwise encodes the amino acid methionine.
This scheme could code for 64-2 possible amino acids, but only 22 amino acids are used in life, so some amino acids can be encoded in more than one way. I guess an alternative would generate an "invalid codon" error in such a situation - but living things don't have a suitable output device attached.
Even a cursory reading of that must make you wonder if it could really have 'emerged' or arrived by chance. Remember that until you get to the stage of a single cell, there is no such thing as natural selection to devise such a scheme.
Of course, a computer is made in a special factory, and similarly there is a substantial collection of proteins needed to use the code I have just described. The strange thing is that al the proteins for this mechanism are simply encoded in the same scheme.
I have not got into the work of the DI, but without all the baggage of the debate as to where life came from, would you really say "Aha - that is obviously something that could have happened by chance!?"
If I have whet your appetite I'll continue.
David