Guy Threepwood
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- Oct 16, 2019
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Yep, that's how software is hierarchical. One routine calls another by making choices (logical expressions) with inputs, etc., etc., etc.
Now you veering dangerously close to the "I make web pages, therefore I program" fallacy. But I digress...
Not at all, I started programming in the early 80's including in pure machine code - I do work on some commercial websites today just because I kinda have to in my territory, but the limitations of cross compatibility are very frustrating v being able to squeeze the most out of a particular platform.
Except gene regulation and expression use various chemicals. They require a molecule of a particular type (say some sort of regulator component) to attach to something that allows or stops something from happening.
You are talking about the hardware- the medium used by the information system- of course the biological medium is different than used by today's computers- though in the case of 'DNA computing' the medium is one and the same.
Computer programs don't work that way. I don't press a button that makes a bunch of mini "post reply" programs that float about in memory until they find an open "post-reply" receptor on the web page "gene" and then it activates the function and my post is posted. Instead there is an active program monitoring my mouse being run by the program scheduler. When it detects my mouse click it transmits a message to the window manager that determines it was over the "Post Reply" button in this web page and sends a signal to the browser to activate that code and the the web page activates the code that sends my post to the CF server.
I certainly don't mean to imply any sort of equivalence in the sophistication of each information system.
As you point out, our technology is extremely clumsy and crude in comparison- DNA is nanotech parallel computing beyond our dreams.
Imagine a computer where trillions of independent nanomachines interact, building themselves and new circuits on the fly to communicate with each other and perform trillions of tasks simultaneously.
Still a hierarchical digital information system- but far more advanced.
I remember the day when you only needed 7-bits to encode keyboard output...
well sure- and they still do, the extra bit is for extended symbols
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