>Stephen Jones quoted Dean Kenyon:
>
>>"INFORMATION NEVER ARISES FROM PHYSICAL OR CHEMICAL
>>CAUSES ALONE." (Davis P. & Kenyon D.H., "Of Pandas and People: The
>>Central Question of Biological Origins", Foundation for Thought and
>>Ethics: Richardson TX, Second Edition, 1993, pp55 My emphasis).
>
>I am going to regret starting this, because I probably won't be able to
>engage in as much discussion as I would like to over the next few weeks.
>My arm is going to be operated on Tuesday. But here goes.
>
I will ditto this. I'm totally bogged down with work right now but
couldn't resist emerging momentarily from the abyss of contract
renewal time ;-).
>This statement is absolutely wrong, wrong, wrong.
>
Now, now Glenn. No sense replacing one dogma by another ;-).
I think the best reply to the quote above is simply
"how do you know?". A statement that something NEVER happens
should be based on a really basic fundamental principle
analogous say to something like the second law of thermo.
We can have great confidence in saying that some processes
will NEVER occur if we can show that the process violates
the second law of thermodynamics. Is there such a principle
for information? I don't think so but I have a suggestion
where to look. Try to find an information analogue to the
first law, i.e. conservation of information. Worth a Nobel
prize methinks :-).
>INFORMATION STORAGE IS PHYSICAL
>
[snip]
>UNDERSTANDING INFORMATION IS PHYSICAL
>
[...]
>
>Computation, IS, a physical event. It requires energy expenditure,
>(Yockey, 1992), it manipulates the physical states of matter. This is
>true regardless of whether the computational device is an abacus or a
>brain.
Yes, computation is physical but this doesn't mean that information is
physical. Yockey discusses this point in his letter to _BioEssays_:
===Begin Yockey====================================================
Like all messages, the life message is non-material but has an information
content
measurable in bits and bytes and plays the role, ascribed by vitalists, of an
unmeasurable, metaphysical vital force without being _ad hoc_, romantic,
spooky,
contrary to the laws of physics or supernatural. Of course, like all messages,
the genetic message, although non-material, must be recorded in matter or
energy.
Scientists, throughout the world, are busy sequencing the human genome and the
genomes of other organisms and recording them in computer hard drives, the
information capacity of which is measured in bits and bytes. These genetic
messages '..._contain all the biologically meaningful aspects of genetic
information that represent the purposeful organization (sic) of living cells
and organisms_.' Whose _purpose_ is it? Information can be measured; science
must concern itself with what can be measured and leave subjective concepts
like _meaning_ and _purpose_ to philosophers and theologians.
[Yockey is quoting Lifson, see ref. below--BH]
The genetic logic system must be capable of accomodating the genetic messages
of all organisms that have ever lived, live now, or will be evolved in the
future. The DNA sequences that make up the genome of any organism are
_selected from a set_ of possible messages. As Schrodinger had pointed out
previously, the number of such sequences is transcomputational in magnitude
and provides more than ample capacity to record the complexity of living
organisms. Thus the biological information system or genetic logic system
is independent of the specificity or meaning of the genetic message in the
genome. All communication systems will process meaningless noise as well as a
play by Sophocles
-- H.P. Yockey, "Information in bits and bytes", _BioEssays_, vol. 17, no. 1,
1995, pp. 85-88. [This is a letter in reply to S. Lifson, "What is Information
for Molecular Biology", _BioEssays_, vol. 16, no. 5, 1995, pp. 373-375]
===End Yockey==================================================================
>
>HOW IS MEANING DETERMINED?
>
>When someone says the sound "bay" (sounded as in english) how do we
>determine meaning? Does the meaning reside fundamentally in the sound?
>Of course not. In English, 'bay' may mean 'an arm of the ocean', 'the
>sound of a dog talking to the moon', 'the color reddish brown', or
>something done to the enemy, as in 'held at bay'.
>
>In Mandarin this sound can mean 'cup', 'sad', 'carry on the back',
>'inferior', 'upright stone tablet', 'north', 'a scallop', and 'a quilt'
>among others.
>
>The same meaning is given to different sounds in various languages.
>Farmer is 'nong ming' in Mandarin, 'agricola' in Latin, and 'fermier' in
>French. Thus meaning does not fundamentally reside in the sound.
>Meaning resides in the dictionary in the brain -- which is physical!
>
Meaning is not an intrinsic property, it does not reside in the "dictionary
of the brain" but instead is established by mutual consent between two or
more parties. Meaning is not material.
>INFORMATION IN COMPLEX SYSTEMS
>
>Consider the equation Z(i)=Z(i-1)^2+C. This deceptively simple equation
>contains more information and is more complex than nearly any other
>mathematical equation. This is the Mandelbrot equation. This equation is
>quite simple until it is iterated time and time again over the complex
>plane. The new number Z(i) becomes Z(i-1) in the next iteration. The act
>of iteration produces an object that has many logarithmic spirals in it
>and yet the equation of a logarithmic spiral is not contained in the
>Mandelbrot equation. (A logarithmic spiral is R=Kln(alpha) where R is the
>radius, K a constant and alpha the angle). Where is the information
>stored for the logarithmic spiral? In the iteration of the equation and
>the properties of complex numbers!
>
>Of the Mandelbrot set, Casti (1994, p. 238) writes:
>
>"Furthermore, there are many additional structures that appear at
>various magnification levels. To illustrate , Fig 6.20 shows a
>magnified view of part of the boundary of the set M. New
>structures continue to appear as one goes to higher and higher
>magnifications, the set M remaining forever intricate on any scale.
>It's this kind of never-ending sequence of new patterns that leads
>many to claim that the Mandelbrot set is the most complicated
>object known to humankind."
>
Yes, I remember reading this in Casti's book and similar statements in
many other books. Casti is using "complexity" in very imprecise way
here.
JC: Wow this sure is complex.
BH: Why?
JC: Look at all these pretty colors and this never ending-sequence
new patterns... WOW ain't it pretty?
BH: But I can describe all of this with a few simple equations, how
can it be complex?
JC: But it looks so complex to me.
BH: Doesn't look complex to me.
The problem is that "complexity" is being discussed in a subjective way
here. The best intrinsic, objective definition of complexity that I know
of is algorithmic complexity. When complexity is defined in this way, the
Mandelbrot set has a complexity comparable to "pick nose get warts" ;-).
=======================================================================
The fractal on the cover is part of the Mandelbrot set, and is generated
by a simple computer program. ... the fractal is an example of an object
that looks very complex but is essentially very simple. Its Kolmogorov
complexity is nearly zero.
-- Cover, Thomas and J. A. Thomas (1991). <Elements of Information
Theory>,
John Wiley and Sons, page 152.
=========================================================================
========================
Brian Harper | "People of that kind are academics, scholars,
Associate Professor | and that is the nastiest kind of man I know."
Applied Mechanics | -- Blaise Pascal
Ohio State University |
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