A talk given by Prof. Ravi Gomatam at The 2017 Meeting of the International Society for History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB) took place from 16 to 21 July, 2017, at the Institute of Biosciences of the University of São Paulo, in the city of São Paulo, Brazil.
Abstract: It is significant that efforts to give an entirely physico-chemical account of DNA functioning in a living cell obliged the introduction of the idea of “information flow” as a separate category:
“Our present knowledge of protein synthesis could usefully be set out under three headings, each dealing with a flux: the flow of energy, the flow of matter, and the flow of information…I shall particularly emphasize the third-the flow of information.” [Crick, 1958]
Watson too, wrote: “DNA → RNA → protein. The arrows [here] did not signify chemical transformations, but instead expressed the transfer of genetic information from the sequences of nucleotides in DNA molecules to the sequences of amino acids in proteins.” [Crick 1968, emphasis added]
Crick [1958] called the idea of “flow of information” a “dogma”, because it was hypothesized to not have a physical basis within science (i.e., to not involve the flow of matter or energy). As a result, there is a continuing philosophical debate over whether ‘information’ in biology is just a name for what are ultimately physico-chemical interactions [Godfrey-Smith 2007]. Clearly, a new physical basis is needed to render information a true biological notion that is scientifically testable.
The emergence of ‘Quantum Information’ as a possible new physical ontology for quantum physics is relevant in this regard. But its definition is not yet in hand. I shall motivate a notion of “objective semantic information” (OSI) as a tenable, new conception of quantum information, and motivate a way to use it to apply the Schrodinger equation at the macroscopic level. Such an OSI at the macro level will be complementary to both current microscopic quantum mechanics and classical mechanics.
The potential implications of OSI and the proposed macroscopic quantum mechanics (MQM) for biology will be drawn out. At present, genetic information is restricted to protein synthesis, a molecular level process. OSI, being in the macroscopic regime, will not refer to atomic and molecular level processes. In this sense, we could treat biological information qua OSI to be complementary to present genetic information. This complementarity will clarify why biological information qua OSI will involve no matter flow or energy flow. Furthermore, being at the macroscopic level, OSI would be present and available everywhere in the cell, not just in the DNA. That will be also consistent with the holism that quantum theory entails. It can lead to a new, consistently semantic informational view of biological functioning at the macroscopic level. I will discuss what it would take to practically implement the envisaged macroscopic quantum physics and OSI within biology.
Crick F.H.C. (1958), “On Protein Synthesis”, Symposium of the Society for Experimental Biology 12: p. 143-144.
Godfrey-Smith, P. (2007), “Information in Biology”, in The Cambridge Companion to the Philosophy of biology, ed. D. Hull and M. Ruse, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 103-119.
Watson, J.D. (1969), The Double Helix (New York: Signet), p. 98