From: Glenn Morton (glenn.morton@btinternet.com)
Date: Tue Nov 19 2002 - 16:41:00 EST
Wayne wrote:
>Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 4:54 PM
>Subject: RE: Dembski and Caesar cyphers
>
>
>Glenn Morton wrote:
>
>> But one must realize that the assignment of symbols to a given sound
>> is merely an accident of history. In alternative histories, it would be
>> quite possible that the above sequence would be readable and the lower
>> looking random. Because of this there is no objective
>definition of design.
>>
>
>Glenn, I think we would have a lot of trouble
>pronouncing "xfbtfm". <grin>
>
>But on a bit more of a serious note, I would
>expect that there are constraints on natural
>language that restrict the types of sound
>constructions that can be made.
Two comments. First, the fact that x stands for the z or x sound is merely
historical accident. If the framers of the first alphabet had chosen an x
for the sound m,, an f for the sound e, b for the sound n, t for the sound d
and m for the sound r, you would have:
mender.
One must realize that what we have in the way of language, letters,
pronounciation simply wasn't dropped on us by God on two stone tablets.
Tonight I went to hear Sir Patrick Moore, a famous astronomer. His accent
was so bad that I couldn't understand him very well. He thinks he speaks
perfectly good english, and he probably thinks I have attrocious cowboy
pronounciation. Pronounciations and sound associations change over time.
>
>There are also
>factors like the laziness of the tongue so
>some regional accents (like mine) say "wash"
>as "warsh". If you pay attention to the glide
>of the tongue, and you don't stop the flow of
>air as you move from "wa" to "sh", you will find
>your tongue passing through the region where the
>sound "r" comes out. Likewise, in Greek the
>letter "Beta" is now pronounced "veta". That is
>because "b" and "v" involve similar positions
>of the lips. So not only the types of sounds
>but even their direction of alteration (mutation)
>will tend toward rules of efficiency (I suspect).
>
>So the short form is that I think there are restrictions that
>limit what sorts of letter
>sequences will be allowed in natural language.
There are limits to the sounds, (but they are very very broad limits. But
there really was no reason a t should be pronounced as an american
pronounces it. Indeed, cockneys use a gutteral stop to pronounce the t they
read. It doesn't sound like our t at all. it sounds like bah le for bottle.
>
>To take this a bit further....
>Frankly, I'm not as convinced that _any_ old
>amino acid sequence will give you a functional
>protein is some relative context either. I
>think the problem is that the thermodynamics
>of protein folding have been badly mucked up.
>When you get the thermodynamics right, you also
>start getting sensible predictions. What function
>a given protein "serves", _might_ be somewhat
>arbitrary, but thermodynamics rules (as always)
>and that will set limits on what structures can be
>"meaningful" in that "some context". In short,
>I suspect the free energy landscape is a bit more
>restricted than some people have been claiming.
Well there are, according to Yockey's calulation 10^94 different proteins
which will perform the same functionality as cytochrome c. see Hubert
Yockey, Information Theory and Molecular Biology, (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1992), p. 59.
There are only around 10^7 species on the planet. There is an incredible
overabundance of variability.
glenn
see http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/dmd.htm
for lots of creation/evolution information
anthropology/geology/paleontology/theology\
personal stories of struggle
>
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