A._Coward comments on Natural Selection's Speed Limit and Complexity Bound - Less Wrong

4 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 04 November 2007 04:54PM

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Comment author: A._Coward 05 November 2007 03:29:35AM 0 points [-]

"But basically, the 1 bit/generation bound is information-theoretic; it applies, not just to any species, but to *any* self-reproducing organism, even one based on RNA or silicon. The specifics of how information is utilized, in our case DNA -> mRNA -> protein, don't matter."

OK, and I'm familiar with information theory (less so with evolutionary biology, but I understand the basics) but I'm thinking that the 1 bit/generation bound is -- pardon the pun -- a bit misleading, since:

1. A lot -- I mean a _lot_ -- of crazy assumptions are made without any hard evidence to back them up. (E.g., the "mammals produce on average ~4 offspring, and when they produce more, it's compensated for by selection's inefficiencies.")

2. I'm still not convinced that we're measuring in the right units. Some mutations do absolutely nothing (for example, if a segment of DNA translating to a UAU codon mutated into one translating to UAC), and some make a ridiculously huge difference. This kind of redundancy, along with many other factors, makes me wonder if we need to change the 1 bit by some scaling factor...