genetic information (was Re: Computation and Human Experience(RRE)

[Dace]

>Dace wrote:
>> What the body does with its proteins is not determined by genes, and
>> biologists know this.  DNA just gets the ball rolling, and depending on
the
>> hill, you don't know where that thing is going.  That's why genetic
>> engineering is so problematic.  You transfer a gene associated with a
>> particular characteristic from one species to another, and you might get
the
>> desired result, but more than likely you'll get some totally surprising
>> effect.  The desired trait is simply not encoded in the gene.  For all
>> intents and purposes, biotech firms are patenting gibberish.
>
Peter van Heusden wrote:
>You could equally argue that since programs do not encode computer
>behaviour, but are rather interpreted by the computing machinery, they do
>not contain information (after all, try transferring a computer program
>from one kind of computer to another).

Actually, if programs were interpreted by computers, then they would indeed
contain information.  But interpretation implies a range of possibilities or
at least a degree of subjectivity.  Computers just obediently follow the
laws of physics.  It's strictly automatic.  There's no more interpretation
in a computer than there is in a cylinder when a piston "interprets" an
explosion of gasoline as meaning, "I should move up now."  The same mistake
occurs in biology regarding language and genes.  What kind of a language
contains not only the words themselves but a further set of words which
determines what will be expressed in a given situation?
>
>I'm all for arguing against 'genetic determinism' as a sound way of
>understanding biology, but you're bending the stick to the point of
>ridiculousness. No amount of proclaiming is going to stop companies
>milking the hell out of the genome, patented or not

Since the patenting of genes is justified on the grounds that they
constitute a form of intellectual property, publicizing the falsity of
"genetic information" would undermine the legal basis for such patenting.
But far more importantly, we must expose the absurdity in the phrase,
"genetic engineering."  Organisms are not machines.  That they utilize
chemical and physical mechanisms does not mean they are themselves
mechanisms.  What happened to our sense of the ineffable in life?  We're
tampering with something we *fundamentally* do not understand.  This is
crucial in turning the tide.  The clear implication is that the technology
of genetic splicing must remain 100% in the public sphere.  It's criminally
reckless to allow profit-making from a technique that involves processes and
ramifications that are totally beyond our comprehension.  And let's not
forget that the traditional term for the private ownership of living,
productive processes is slavery.  This is the logic of life-as-machine, with
humans as nothing more than the transition between organic machines and
rationalized machines.

Here's an issue where we could really reverse the trend toward
privatization.  But we've got to make it clear that we're dealing with
something much deeper than mere "engineering."

Ted