Reflectorites
On Sun, 28 May 2000 12:33:21 +0100, Richard Wein wrote:
[...]
>SJ>That Leishman does not get Dembski's name right, only adds to its
>>genuineness as a non-partisan opinion (I had never heard of him
>>before this).
RW>Thanks, Stephen. You gave me the best laugh I've had all day. (I suppose
>that doesn't say much for my day so far!)
[...]
I am pleased that I have been able to brighten up Richard's day! Richard's
reply brightened up *my* day, for this reason:
"People who resort to ridicule are often covering up something."
(Johnson P.E., "A Reply to My Critics," in "Evolution as Dogma: The
Establishment of Naturalism," 1990, p34.
http://www.arn.org/docs/johnson/pjdogma3.htm).
Steve
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"The development of the metabolic system, which, as the primordial soup
thinned, must have "learned" to mobilize chemical potential and to
synthesize the cellular components, poses Herculean problems. So also
does the emergence of the selectively permeable membrane without which
there can be no viable cell. But the major problem is the origin of the
genetic code and of its translation mechanism. Indeed, instead of a problem
it ought rather to be called a riddle. The code is meaningless unless
translated. The modern cell's translating machinery consists of at least fifty
macromolecular components which are themselves coded in DNA: the
code cannot be translated otherwise than by products of translation. It is
the modern expression of omne vivum ex ovo. When and how did this
circle become closed? It is exceedingly difficult to imagine." (Monod J.,
"Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern
Biology", [1971], Transl. Wainhouse A., Penguin Books: London, 1997,
reprint, p142).
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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