Dear Fis,
Both Stan and Jerry raise points about whether the fact of having figured out
how genetic information, in its abstracted and formalised version, can be
transferred between the living organism and its dna, does or will generally
improve a chemist's lot.
Both interjections address important questions.
Stan says:
> SS: What I meant is no compelling model of an 'RNA First world'
> as a model of the origin of life. That is, life begins with
> spontaneously synthesized catalytic RNA molecules. My point is a
> materialist one, not a logical one.
Jerry says:
> Chemical information is grounded in the list of chemical elements and the >
relations among them.
> The terms "DNA" and "RNA" etc, are chemical names of specific
relationally >
rich bio-molecules.
> The information content of chemical molecules must be expressed in
> terms of atomic numbers and relations among the electrical particles
(graphs).
> Biological information emerges as flows of changes of chemical relations
- >
metabolic dynamics.
> In general, chemical structures / information does support transitive
> relations among the atomic numbers organized into graphs.
> Thus, if one wishes to develop a compelling argument about chemical
> numbers and structures and genetic information, one should start with
> relational algebras that keep track of changes of relations.
The common question both Jerry and Stan raise, as I understand it, is:
Does the fact that a slight inner inconsistency has been found in our counting
system mean anything for actual science? Will the existence, extent and other
properties of the inner duality of the counting system allow modelling, even
simulating biology?
My answer is:
Yes, it does. By finding a. the principle, b. the numeric properties of a
basic
building block, the road is open to define a mathematical object which serves
well as an "atom". The Lego building block, which the last posting explained
how to find, is a "density with properties" that certainly exists. This is
what
one calls an atom in chemistry.
Our semantic differences are just that, trade language differences.
The situation is comparable to that of writing a compiler that translates
input
(as a symbol arrangement on a commutative assembly) into output (as a symbol
arrangement on a sequenced multitude) and back. The data processing trade uses
its own slang. The meaning of the news this person advocates in FIS is exactly
that what you ask for, as future users of the compiler.
Your user requirements are a specific aspect of what the compiler can and will
do. In the data processing view chemistry is a part of user requirements.
It is
too early to discuss the user interfaces yet. The inner workings of the
compiler allow (and require) for the certain existence of logical objects that
have properties that can and cannot come to lie next to each other in
dependence of the properties.
The last time the task was attacked it had the name of "Unified Field Theory".
The present approach presupposes the Field to be quite densely full with
mathematical objects which have predictable properties. The a-priori
structured
Field gets its a-priori structure from the slack (torsion, over- underdensity)
that exists between counting lines.
Your user requirements show the keen interest and high expectations you set
into the improved counting system. They are a bit early to discuss. Shannon
might have nodded friendly as they asked him: shall we be able to download
without wires music from computers and listen to them in a tiny device the
size
of a credit card? Yes, whatever can be enumerated, can be found on N. This was
Shannon's answer and dead right he was.
You ask me: shall we be able to build molecules that <...please insert your
futuristic idea here...>? The friendly answer is again: Yes, whatever can be
enumerated, can be found on N and, depending the case, on M, or on M, and,
depending the case, on N.
The user may not be satisfied with the technician's answer. Yet, presently
this
is the best answer you can get from the workshop.
Basic research has come up with a gadget. The gadget looks promising and basic
research swears by its ancestors' bones that it is that gadget all were
looking
for. This is the wheel, calendar, electricity, radio and the dishwasher that
each revolutionised whole societies in a historic dimension. Just, it happens
to have got evolved as a data processing question, and later migrated into the
philosophy of numbers, in fact, a kind of number theory, and that trade has as
an added disadvantage that its sales force does not have anything to carry
around in order to demonstrate the practicality of the wheel, the steam
engine,
etc. on, but the numbers. We deal with the order among our concepts as we
discuss how and what we measure.
The improved measurement instrument does have by itself, available at power-up
time, certainly existing subsets with definite properties, and these
properties
do simulate the basic ideas about neutron and proton+electron, and there are
only a few of them, and they have an intricate logical relation among each
other. Rest assured, the gadget does deliver usable concepts of atom so you
can
start building molecules in the not so distant future.
The fate of a great invention depends on many factors. The results of basic
research will become application in dependence of the behaviour of the people
surrounding basic research, the scientists and the science managers. How fast,
and for which applied science tailored to measure it will appear in an
application first, is a managerial question, not one of cuts and stitches.
Even, if the present audience does nothing to further the translation of
stereo
counting into his or any trade,
*counting the cuts together with the stitches is a principle that will make
its way to the general public, by its own merits, inevitably, sooner or later.
*
This is an idea for which the time is always right to propose, but in times
afore, computers were not as readily available, so the idea was impossible to
investigate (because it involves quite a lot of counting). There is a little
bit of common sense to this idea, and it smells to the layman, too, like it
could be useful in chemistry and theoretical physics.
It depends on many factors, how an idea translates into profit (whatever form
profit will appear in). Among the factors that influence the fate of this idea
you and your action or inaction are quite important and relevant.
Thank you for the inquiry whether one may model chemistry better than
heretofore by an improved counting system, which also considers the cuts along
with the stitches. The answer is positive: yes, this is the direction the
research is taking. More helping brains can well improve the speed and the
precision of the effort. Thanks again for thinking along.
Karl
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