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> I like when humans finally caught up to this advanced biological process and had to compare it to machines that humans created that led to this discovery just
by joshuahedlund 4y ago
> I like when humans finally caught up to this advanced biological process and had to compare it to machines that humans created that led to this discovery just to understand it.
The solar system is like a clock. Cells are like machines. Brains are like computer networks.
It's interesting to realize how regularly we map our discoveries about the physical world to the technologies of the day, "just to understand it," and also interesting to be reminded of the limitations of such analogies.
The best and most literal parallel I can think of is DNA is like code. Yet I find it interesting, almost uncanny, that we discovered that right around the same time we started developing prgoramming languages.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- jakear 4y ago> The best and most literal parallel I can think of is DNA is like code. Yet I find it interesting, almost uncanny, that we discovered that right around the same time we started developing prgoramming languages. Eh... codons were only discovered in 1961 (Crick, Brenner et al. experiment), the Jacquard Loom was invented in 1804.
- dekhn 4y agoI think the better parallel is information theory and DNA coding, which happened around the same time, and there was a lot of flow from the IT folks to the DNA folks when people were trying to deduce the "code". See https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3220916/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3220916/ and other things written by Schneider