Windows of opportunities vs. building life

"The fact that the "simplest" single-cell exhibits intentionality, that biological information is prescriptive (i.e., "instructional," "procedural") and has the property of intentionality, and that the processing of biological information occurs via an empirically-verified set of non-physical, arbitrary coding rules mapped on to an arbitrary symbol code (genetic code) where molecules function as representative token symbols in the communication and processing of said information is not something that can be immediately derived from non-intentional, non-arbitrary, deterministic chemistry"

Isn't 'intentionality' a rather loaded term? It suggests something capable of having intentions & doesn't that prejudice the argument from the very beginning?

I've never heard any scientist in the field of organic chemistry or biology claim that our undertanding of these subjects is anything but incomplete, so let's not claim that all we know is all there is to know. no such claim was made But that's no excuse for reaching for highly improbable explanations in those areas where our knowledge is lacking. we can't actually say how probable or improbable such an explanation is anymore than someone can accurately calculate the probability or improbability of abiogenesis, and again, this is not an argument from ignorance

Not my experience with you with chemists.

I find I'm I have to repeat things already covered with you. Written instruction are not required to guide the rain, build snow flakes, or any other natural events. 

No, intentionality is not a loaded term, but I can understand how it might seem so.  Intentionality = "about-ness" (e.g., one can have a belief about icebergs but an iceberg is not itself about anything; living things, however, very clearly are "about" something--the meta goal of maintaining homeostasis far from equilibrium to stay alive, for one).  The term does have a long history in philosophy and was originally applied to debates about mental phenomena and cognition (which is why it understandbly might seem like a loaded term), but the concept now has much broader application.

The eminent biologist, Maynard Smith used it to explain how biological (genetic) information is more than just simple "Shannon-type" information (which includes all types of information from genetic to information solar radiation gives us).  As Maynard Smith put it, a black cloud gives us information (e.g., that it will rain) but a black cloud does not exist for that purpose.  A weather forecast, however, does and information of that type can be said to have the property of intentionality.  Maynard Smith then goes on to explain how this is the type of information and information processing we see in cells and when it comes to the genetic code (*and also developmental programs; protein determinants in egg-cell cytoplasm provide information to direct the development of embryos and this type of goal-directed, prescriptive information is distinctly different from the "black-cloud-tells-us-it's-going-to-rain"-type).

It's a fascinating topic to get into more (and has spurred the development of many new fields such as biosemiotics), but I don’t want us to miss seeing the forest through the trees by missing my overall point, which I will summarize and also state in a different way:

(1) Others may still disagree with the conclusion that @TruthMuse comes to (and many do!), but in doing so I don't think you, me or anyone can say that his inference to agency (or to a "programmer") from linear digital prescriptive genetic information that consists of executable programs processed via an intermediary, arbitrary genetic code, etc., etc. is inherently unsound, irrational or illogical.  Indeed, on the face of it, it seems a quite natural and straightforward inference to make and that one could rationally make not from ignorance but based on our experience and knowledge of how executable programs arise.  Such a conclusion may ultimately be wrong and it can certainly be disagreed with, but on the face of it, I see nothing inherently illogical with the argument.  Do you? (acknowledging, of course, your disagreement with the argument and the fact that you are not persuaded by it)

(2) We certainly can't dispute the argument on the basis of our own ignorance  (or science's own ignorance, rather) when it comes to the origin of life.  Saying no one has shown that abiogenesis is impossible, doesn't seem to negate the inference by any means.  Nor can we even claim that no one has shown that abiogenesis is impossible when we haven't even first established what it would take to falsify abiogenesis (which, admittedly, does beg the question of how it qualifies as a testable scientific hypothesis)

(3) Given the above (and my post prior to this) it still seems that the burden of proof would fall on anyone who disputes it to demonstrate otherwise (which currently, we are unable to do)

(*plus, again, the fact that a world renown scholar of Antony Flew's caliber advanced a similar argument, commands attention and should at the very least give us pause before just simply dismissing such a line of reasoning outright.  Agreed?)

Well perhaps if you were clearer? I asked you before to explain what you meant by 'code' & 'written instruction' regarding the emergence of life.

There're are no such things in DNA. The processes of organic chemistry may be ordered but that doesn't mean they are controlled by some kind of (written) program.

Are you of the opinion nothing is controlling the placement and activities of all of the various parts, systems, down to the cellular level?

My opinion is much the same as that of the majority of biologists & I certainly don't hear them, as a profession, advancing the kinds of ideas you have. They seem to be largely satisfied that the organisation within a cell can (or will) be explained in terms of the organic chemistry taking place.

More correctly with just one chemist! When I hear dozens more, then hundreds more (etc.) coming out & supporting the view that life could not have emerged by any natural means, I'll certainly review what I think on the matter.

But when a single member of any scientific profession voices the opinion that something is impossible, guided as much (it seems) by their faith as by their scientific understanding, I'll pass thanks very much.

My opinion is much the same as that of the majority of biologists & I certainly don't hear them, as a profession, advancing the kinds of ideas you have. They seem to be largely satisfied that the organisation within a cell can (or will) be explained in terms of the organic chemistry taking place.

You've referred to 'intentionality' yes, see explanation above, 'meta goal' yes, see the example I gave above & "programmer" (TruthMuse's characterisation) correct, this is not how I would characterize but what exactly do you have in mind?

TruthMuse seems to be suggesting that a mind I would dispute the use of "mind" is required in order to bring something as complex as the first living organism into existence whether it is or not, it is true that abiogenesis does encounter immense physio-chemical difficulties as well as conceptual (see below). Well what form would this 'mind' take - can't we guess? no idea, which is why I dispute the use of "mind," which I find ambiguous

And then there's the thorny question of how such a mind might have come into existence itself not a thorny question at all, simply a separate question, at which point we realise that we haven't so much answered the question of how life emerged on earth, as raised a host of entirely new questions. the same would be true w/abiogenesis and science in general; we always end up with more questions.  Using your Prometheus example, let's say for sake of argument initial life on earth was bioengineered by an intelligent alien race that then left earth and left no evidence of where they came from.  Our inability to answer the latter would not invalidate the truth of the former

I will start using agency instead of mind. I am not sure how anyone who holds to a pure natural materialistic world view can accept abiogenesis can not be shown true using only chemistry.

To answer that, they point to the many flaws found in the physiology of modern organisms. Rather than the percections.

These flaws strongly suggest a lack of agency.

We can discuss the flaws if you want, but you are telling me a spelling error proves to you someone didn't write a paper?

The sample size I have with you shows you do not give someone a fair hearing, and if what he said was about his opinions, you'd have the right to complain. Since you didn't listen to him, his views are nothing you can compare to what others have said. You listen to what 10 minutes of a lecture somewhere around an hour and a half long. The part you heard you didn't even describe correctly.

Quote a couple here on the topic, present a link I can watch.

But as we've talked about before this is simply presumption and faith/belief un-backed by empirical verification.  Whatever the merits (or not) of @TruthMuse 's argument(s), we can't reject it on this "basis"--which is really no basis at all

We can discuss the flaws if you want, but you are telling me a spelling error proves to you someone didn't write a paper?

Note: Somehow we seem to keep bypassing my overall points, which I'd like to come back to.  I get the skepticism toward applying information, programming, coding language, etc. to biology. You're in good company.  Many biologists stuck in the reductionist views of old still struggle w/this and presuppose it can't be true.  But the truth is this info/coding-speak is not mere analogy but reality that biologists are increasing having to come to grips with (I am one such biologist).  We are talking about real linear digital genetic information and the genetic code is a real, actual code.

(1) The information-based and directed "chemistry of life" via an arbitrary symbol code has no corollary in the nonliving, physio-chemical world. We expected cells would be simple "blobs" of protoplasm that can be reduced to and explained by basic chemistry; we were wrong and this creates a huge gap between the living and nonliving.  We do not, in fact, know how to bridge this gap or solve this problem by chemistry alone when it comes to the origin of life because the problem is on an entirely different level

"There is nothing in the physico-chemical world that remotely resembles reactions being determined by a sequence and codes between sequences."--HP Yockey

"For a long time it has been assumed that the rules of the genetic code were determined by chemistry - either by stereochemical affinities or by metabolic reactions - but the experimental evidence has revealed a totally different reality; it has been shown that any codon can be associated to any amino acid, and this means that there is no deterministic link between them. The genetic code, in other words, is based on arbitrary, or conventional, rules and this raises a formidable problem: how can arbitrary rules exist in Nature? We know that such rules exist in culture, but there is an abyssal difference between biology and culture, because the cultural codes are short-lived, whereas the biological codes are the most conserved entities in evolution."--M Barbieri

"Instead, the living cell is best thought of as a supercomputer - an information processing and replicating system of astonishing complexity. DNA is not a special life-giving molecule, but a genetic databank that transmits its information using a mathematical code. Most of the workings of the cell are best described, not in terms of material stuff - hardware - but as information, or software. Trying to make life by mixing chemicals in a test tube is like soldering switches and wires in an attempt to produce Windows [OS]. It won't work because it addresses the problem at the wrong conceptual level."--Paul Davies

(2) Again, there is nothing in the nonliving world that remotely compares to this and in fact, the only corollary we know of that can come close (but still falls shorts of what we observe in cells) is the invention of computer programming, coding, operating systems, etc., by humans some four billion years later.

(3) Given that information processing systems in living things have no corollary in the nonliving world (nor can such be immediately derived from nonliving chemistry) and also given that the only known example of a similar phenomenon is computer programming/coding by humans some four billion years later, then it seems entirely reasonable, rational and straightforward for one to infer that said biological information processing systems are similarly the result of some type of intentionality or intentional agency (in fact, the burden of proof is on those who would claim otherwise to demonstrate how intentionality can arise from non-intentionality) (*logically, I do not see how one can go any further than this; i.e., we would not be able to infer anything about the nature of such an agency (whether natural, supernatural, alien, what have you), by this argument)

(4) Again, I must stress that this is a philosophical argument and not a scientific one (nor would science even recognize).  That said, @stephen_33 and @TruthMuse I am hoping that at minimum we can at least get on the same page here and agree that while others may reject this type of argument and ultimately find it non persuasive and unconvincing that we can at least agree that we can't really fault someone else for accepting such an argument because on the face of it, such an inference is a natural one and not inherently illogical or irrational.  Is that something that we can all agree on?