Explain love, heroism and forgiveness if life is merely survival of the fittest?

[swilow]

It helps when you are trying to mold the evidence to fit a particular theory

A groundbreaking moment of self-reflection?

 

[sekio]

If an enzyme reads one base as another, doesn't it also have to read the linked base as the opposite or the eventual reconstruction of DNA will fail?

No, most enzymes only read or manipulate only one strand of DNA at a time. The enzymes that replicate DNA for instance basically 'unzip' the strand and make a new complementary pair, which floats around unpaired until another enzyme binds to it and makes a complementary strand.

DNA can be repaired if only one of the two bases in a pair is damaged and certain DNA repair enzymes are present, there are actually enzymes that can e.g. demethylate bases as well. The various DNA repair/proofreading enzymes could also simply excise the fucked up base from the strand too, resulting in a DNA strand shifted by 1 nucleobase (frame shift mutation).

Also it is important to remember that you don't even need mutagens to have errors in replication. Because the nucleobases are fairly similar in structure, (& copying them is a stochastic chemical process) it is unlikely but possible that the wrong base will be incorporated into a strand of DNA during replication, resulting in erroneous DNA. This happens even with stuff like PCR (a DNA amplification technique used for analysis).

 

[Journyman16]

No, most enzymes only read or manipulate only one strand at a time.

When I have read more, I will start another thread - this seems to have gone way beyond the OT. :D

 

[p-helix]

The resource that would be lacking is specified information from intelligence

Intelligence is essential but resources are required. An intelligence of sorts exists as part of every organism.

If I needed to let's say fly from one side of a canyon to another how would trying to fly with my arms (even an infinite number of times) ever get me there naturally. Would it be remotely beneficial trying?

This is off-the-wall though, never mind off the canyon. No doubt they died, through trial and error.

Intelligently aware of what is going on would be a general definition of mine.
Being able to think with reason and add new specified information to the memory based on this reason would start getting a little more specific

Memory is part of all living organisms and arguably all non-living ones. Being able to 'think with reason' makes me think of people. Perhaps some animals too have conciousness according to your definition. Personally, I would say plants modify themselves to combat predators, deficiencies and disease as much as animals.

We can program a robot to respond to such things as tempature, wind, light etc but that gives them no consciousness. Robots can not program themselves with new specified information.
They just execute what commands they are given.

Plants are not 'Artificial Intelligence' any more than we are. We are all organic life-forms, methamaniac, give plants a chance.

Yes, may describe consciousness different but that doesn't affect what it is.
I tend to see consciousness seperate from the
body/matter.
I look at it like information stored on a form of light. The light is awareness and how the light is
arranged and behaves makes it conscious.
The more light and more information- the more consciousness.

The sun is matter which produces light. Perhaps light too is matter (of the lightest sort). I say this because photons, apparently, are particles similar to electrons with a similar mass. Considering light travels at 186,000 miles a second, catching these particles and weighing them would be difficult, and no doubt they do not weigh much. I wonder what a year's worth falling into one square metre would weigh, less than 1mg? The fact plants are absorbing light which they use to make themselves makes them concious according to your very definition. I would not disagree.

I believe we all exist in the environment, but the environment itself isn't what produces us.

Why not? We take in our environment as food and organisms from our environment, our parents, produced us.

All your examples above are borrowing "light" from the big conciousness. Whether we/they can keep it or not is the question.
I think it is possible.

The concept of a 'big conciousness' is not unreasonable. Think away, thoughts are the limits of what we think to be possible.