The code that is DNA

[polymath257]

Polymath,
In regard to your lightening strike analogy, it’s true we don’t really know where it’s going to strike , the laws of physics/nature are governing and it’s random.
The ordering of nucleotides however, must be governed phenomena because it becomes instructions  that get decoded. The order represents something more than just the material it’s made from, this is profound.
however a lightning strike does not represent
anything but itself , doesn’t get decoded into a specific function nor gets error corrected.
I take it John 6IX has realized there is something  unnatural at play.

But it *isn't* instructions that get decoded. For example, there is no stretch of DNA that describes how to build an arm. There is no stretch of DNA that tells how to build a stomach.

The idea that DNA is some sort of blueprint is fallacious. Unlike a blueprint, which is isolated and doesn't actively interact with the workers except for conveying information in one direction, there is direction flow both directions in DNA. Not just from DNA-->RNA-->Protein, but also proteins can bind DNA, either promoting or inhibiting transcription.

Instead of being a source for information, the DNA is part of a web of information spread out between the DNA, the RNA,  the proteins, but also involving things like vitamins, and smaller molecules like glucose, etc. Information is simply the existence or concentration of these different chemicals. It is this that drives ALL of the processes of life. But there isn't anything mysterious about how that information arises.

If you only had the stretch of DNA and no prior knowledge of the 'code', there is literally no way to determine what that stretch of DNA is coding for. In fact, if anything, the code itself lies in the tRNA (transfer RNA) that takes a codon and matches it to an amino acid to be assembled by the ribosome. Both the 'translation' given by the tRNA and the assembly of the protein (done by the ribosome) are primarily done by RNA, not DNA.

And, in fact, RNA ia a remarkable little molecule. Like DNA, it can carry information (codons). In fact, as mRNA it carries the DNA 'code' to the ribosome. But, unlike DNA, RNA can actually catalyze biologically relevant reactions. That's what happens in the ribosome, for example. So, instead of having a split between the information and the 'meaning', it is common for RNA to have both within the same molecule.

This is one of the many reasons many scientists think there was an RNA world prior to the adoption of DNA by living things as the genetic material. We even know of self-replicating strands of RNA! The DNA came later as a more stable repository for the genetics.

The upshot? Focusing on DNA is misguided. Information is far more distributed in living things than is suggested by the notion of a DNA 'code'.