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To: GodGunsGuts; OldNavyVet
Dr. Meyer if it turns out that you are completely wrong (and he is 100% correct) re: DNA being a digital code???

I agree that DNA is digital, in that it's primary structure (simple sequence) encoding is in the form of discrete rather than continuous values, i.e. particular nucleotides.

But the "100%" emphatic goes too far. Although many of the aspects have, I think, yet to be well understood, DNA certainly also functions in analogue modes. My understanding of this subject matter is poor, but it seems pretty clear to me that things like, for instance, the complex manner in which DNA is packed and unpacked, must have a lot to do with tertiary structure (basically the 3-D shape of DNA).

This is kind of ironic, really, since you often say things like this:

And let’s not forget the neo-Darwinian reductionist beads-on-a-string notion of genetics is being completely overturned by the new biology.

And yet here you are, treating DNA as if it's digital "beads-on-a-string" aspect represented "100%" of it's significance and all of how it's functions are encoded.

Equally ironic, you've also frequently derided "evolutionists" for assuming that "junk" (properly "non-coding") DNA is without function. (As with the "beads-on-a-string" argument, evolutionists don't actually assume this, you just say they do in furtherance of straw-man abuse.)

But certainly many aspects of non-coding DNA function have to do with analogue (continuously variable) factors, rather than digital (discrete, discontinuously variable) factors. For instance the functional significance of repeating DNA is obviously related to continuously variable factors such as the length and number of repeats.

47 posted on 11/18/2009 12:24:28 AM PST by Stultis (Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia; Democrats always opposed waterboarding as torture)
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To: Stultis
I agree that DNA is digital, in that it's primary structure (simple sequence) encoding is in the form of discrete rather than continuous values, i.e. particular nucleotides.

The way I see it is that all real things are subject to being mathematically described using digital coding (most often binary) processes.

Picture a beautiful rose, and say to yourself: "The world is analog."

51 posted on 11/18/2009 8:00:17 AM PST by OldNavyVet ( Don't drink the KoolAid.)
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