this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2024
638 points (99.2% liked)

Science Memes

10970 readers
3758 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] flora_explora@beehaw.org 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

I do understand how DNA works, I'm actually a biologist. And I don't doubt that it is complex. What I doubt is that it is a complex system of communication. But sure, I see your point that is some form of complex transferral of information and that yes, if I stretch my understanding of language a bit, it probably is one as well. Maybe the next question would be: what is this useful for? What can we learn from that? Like I said (not sure if in this or in another comment), maybe we then need to have various categories for language?

E: and we could explore the new fringe cases a bit more, too. If DNA/RNA is a form of language, then even non-living entities can have language like in form of viruses. If abiotic things get complex enough, would we also call it language at some point? Like chemical reactions?