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To: Southack
DNA does process instruction sets and data, and it is BECAUSE DNA is processing, rather than merely repeating as would a blind template, that DNA knows to ignore an entire gene when we place a genetic marker (in this case the computer programming equivilent of EXIT SUB) at the beginning of the gene's data.

This, I'm afraid, is nonsense. The information in DNA is replicated by a system of enzymes centered around DNA polymerases, and transcribed to RNA by another system of enzymes interacting with the RNA polymerases. DNA does not transcribe itself. It contains start and stop signals for transcription, but these are read by enzymes, not by DNA.

You appear to think DNA is a Turing machine. It isn't.

514 posted on 02/18/2003 8:47:25 AM PST by Right Wing Professor
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To: Right Wing Professor
"This, I'm afraid, is nonsense. The information in DNA is replicated by a system of enzymes centered around DNA polymerases, and transcribed to RNA by another system of enzymes interacting with the RNA polymerases. DNA does not transcribe itself. It contains start and stop signals for transcription, but these are read by enzymes, not by DNA. You appear to think DNA is a Turing machine. It isn't."

You've managed to read my shorthand in some posts (my fault, sorry) and draw a useless conclusion (e.g. that DNA doesn't process data/commands and that DNA isn't a Turing machine).

However, if you are actually intellectually honest (and at this point, I have no reason to doubt that fact) and you read ALL of my posts on this thread, you will see that what I am actually saying (when I'm not being lazy-enough to use shorthand) is that the DNA system (not simply DNA per se) is doing the processing of the data/commands stored in DNA.

And once you understand that I am referring to the entire cell, then you can draw an accurate conclusion (rather than the useless one that you referred to above); namely that the DNA system does indeed process data and commands, and that this DNA system is indeed a Turing Machine.

515 posted on 02/18/2003 9:13:23 AM PST by Southack (Media bias means that Castro won't be punished for Cuban war crimes against Black Angolans in Africa)
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