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Memetics
By: yazar Date: December 23, 2021, 12:50 am
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(Note: I am not totaly agree with author's every idea which is
told below, this is only shared here to show that genes transfer
the information from our ancestors)
Memetics of the Computer Universe Based on the Quran
The emerging concept of computer universe has the potential to
bring about a radical change in our perception of the world.
Energy is word of God that carries His commands. It derives its
properties in accordance with the divine in-structions immanent
in it. Memetics is the science of information carried by the
entity called energy. Living and non-living systems represent
two different languages in which information content of energy
exists. These may be distinguished as bioprogram (biological
information) and abioprogram (chemical information)
respectively. While abio-program can be explained in terms of a
structure-code concept, the bioprogram is intangible to human
beings and is stored on the chromosomes of the cell. It is
non-physical in nature but requires a physical medium for its
storage like the computer program. An organism is natural
biocomputer or biorobot. All organisms except Homo sapiens are
totally programmed unconscious systems like man-made robot. Man
is the only conscious, freewilled robot (abd in Arabic) of God.
Consciousness and freewill are the attributes of the unique
processor of human being, the mind (qalb in Arabic). The
computer model of the organism helps us to define and explain
the phenomena of life and death. The phenomenon of life is the
manifestation of the execution of the biosoftware while death is
the result of deletion of the biosoftware. A dead body is like a
computer without software. Man-made computer, robot, etc., which
run on man-made software are forms of “artificial life”. The
basic change that the computer concept of the universe brings
into our present knowledge of the universe and cosmology is that
it is the divine information carried in energy that represents
the underlying reality of the universe. Keywords: Computer
Universe, Memetics, Abiomemetics, Biomemetics, Phenomena of Life
and Death, Natural Biosoftware Engineering
1. Introduction The universe presents itself a self-propelled,
self-regulated, self-sustained system. An organised reality
exists in nature. The countless number of celestial bodies of
colossal size tracing their own paths in the cosmos without
collision in its 13.75-billion-year history is in-dicative of a
perfectly programmed behaviour. The gravitational force
responsible for this meticulous and amazing consistency in the
peripheral motion and recurring relative positions of stars and
planets do not operate in an arbitrary manner, but obey certain
laws prescribed by the Creator. It is because of this, we are
able to formulate principles which can reflect the natural
order. The high degree of success achieved by man-made
mathematical models in describing and/or predicting several
natural phenomena adds strength to this reasoning. Every natural
process is spontaneous phenomenon. Physical, chemical and
biological processes are spontaneous as though the reacting
species know what they should produce under different
conditions. Their properties and mode of behaviour in diverse
environments are fixed. A plant or an animal develops through
execution of instructions in the sequence specified in the
program stored in its starting cell (e.g., zygote, seed, etc.).
All these are suggestive of a computerised setup. Although
science covers many aspects of the universe from subatomic level
to galaxies and beyond, there are certain fundamental questions
like what is energy, how the various components of the universe
acquired their characteristic properties, how the laws and rules
governing them came into being, what is life, what is death,
etc., that remain unanswered in science. These issues constitute
some of the “fundamental unknowns” about the universe that can
be unravelled by resorting to a computer model in conjunction
with the Quran. This paper addresses these issues and presents a
summary of my work in this line [1,2].
2. The Computer Universe The universe is a computer designed,
programmed and created by God. Konrad Zuse who built the first
programmable computer was the first to suggest in 1967 that the
entire universe was being computed on a computer, possibly a
cellular automaton [3]. He referred to this as “Rechnender Raum”
(Computing Cosmos or Computing Space), which in fact started the
field of digital physics. Jurgen Schmidhuber of Dalle Molle
Institute for Artificial Intelligence (IDSIA), Switzerland,
proposes an algorithmic theory of everything. Schmidhuber
assumes: “a long time ago, the Great Programmer wrote a program
that runs all possible universes on His Big Computer….Each
universe evolves on a discrete time scale….Any universe’s state
at a given time is describable by a finite number of bits” [4].
In 1998, I proposed a computer model of the universe in the
light of the Quran in my book The Divine Expert System [5]. Both
physical universe and biological organisms have been described
as natural computer systems. Four years later, Seth Loyd of
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, published a paper
suggesting that the universe is a quantum computer [6]. He also
elaborated the concept in his subsequent book [7]. Another
notable work in this field is that of Stephen Wolfram from USA
[8]. According to him, all of reality might result from a kind
of algorithm, like a computer program being enacted again and
again on the underlying building blocks of space and matter. He
argues that the whole universe can be viewed as one huge
cellular automaton. Recently Denis Bray suggested every living
cell is a computer [9]. 3. Memetics of the Universe Memetics
is science of information based on the computer model of the
universe. The universe is energy-filled space. Energy is
information. No one knows the fundamental nature of the entity
called energy. Energy lies in the realm of the unknown (i.e.,
intangible to humans). For practical purposes we define energy
in terms of its manifested characteristics. A well-known
definition of energy is that given by Dave Watson: “Energy is a
property or characteristic (or trait or aspect?) of matter that
makes things happen, or, in the case of stored or potential
energy, has the “potential” to make things happen” [10]. Energy
exists in various forms such as matter, kinetic energy,
potential energy, heat, magnetism, electricity, electromagnetic
radiation, sound, etc. All these forms have been described the
way we perceive. The Quran informs us that when God wants to
create a thing, He says “be to it and it comes into being” (Q.
2:117). Note that God says “be” to “the thing” He wants to
create. This means that the thing to be created is already there
in a virtual form (intangible to man). From the Quran, it is
possible to infer that the virtual form is nothing but God’s
words. The word of God is instruction or command (Q. 11:44) and
His words are infinite: “And if all the trees on earth were pens
and the ocean (were ink), with seven oceans behind it to add to
its (supply), yet would not the words of Allah be exhausted (in
the writing): for Allah is exalted in power, full of wisdom.”
(Q. 31:27). God’s words form the instructions (programs) in
intangible form, which we call energy. Therefore, energy is
God’s word that represents the divine software (commands or
instructions). In the light of these revelations, the
phenomenon of creation can be explained in terms of a
ghayb-shahadat paradigm. The verse 31:27 indicates the existence
of a large collection of God’s words (intangible energy). These
in fact constitute the divine programs for whatever thing God
wants to create. The word “it” in the verse 2:117 given above
refers to the divine program concerned. That is, when God wants
to create a thing, He needs say only “be” to “it” (i.e., the
appropriate program of the thing to be created) and “it comes
into being” (i.e., it becomes tangible to man). This implies
that when God gives the command “be” to the intangible (ghayb in
Arabic) program of a thing to be created, it transforms itself
into the form tangible (shahadat in Arabic) to man; i.e., into
the form which human mind can process and interpret. The mind
deciphers it in accordance with the human biosoftware, which
results in conscious perception. The universe is therefore what
human mind constructs as stipulated in the biosoftware. The
phenomenon of creation can therefore be conceived as the
transformation of intangible energy into tangible form. This is
much like the production of a hardcopy (shahadat) of an
intangible (ghayb) document by a computer when a command is
given to it. Two categories of universal components namely,
non-living and living, can be distinguished. The non-living
systems may be thought of as being run on abioprogram (chemical
information) and the living systems on bioprogram (biological
information). These are the two basic forms in which information
exist in the universe. The unit of information (i.e., energy)
may be represented as “meme”. The term “meme” was introduced by
Richard Dawkins to mean “replicator” [11]. However the term is
used here not with the connotation of a “replicator” or with the
other characteristics originally assigned to it. Meme is defined
here as a piece of information (energy) in the abiotic and
biotic segments of the universe. The meme based on abioprogram
may be referred to as “abiomeme” and the meme based on
bio-program may be called “biomeme” [2].
3.1 Abiomemetics Abiomemetics is science of chemical
information. It can be best understood in terms of a
structure-code concept, which is illustrated here taking the
example of matter form of energy. The atom is considered here as
the basic unit of matter for illustrating the concept (Table 1).
The structure signifies a code “written” in a special language
(abioprogram) like the symbolic language used in computer
machines. The semantic content of the code is deciphered in
accordance with the abioprogram and the structure derives its
properties. The Quranic message that the universal components
carry God’s commands (Q. 41:12) can be explained in this way.
The numerous substances found in the universe owe their vastly
diverse properties to their structures, which, in turn, are
decided by the composition and arrangement of atoms. Structure
at the level of a molecule (substance) is the totality of
nuclide composition and arrangement of the atoms. In the
structure-code concept, nuclides form the alphabets and along
with their arrangement, as in a word, through bonding, etc., the
code is deciphered in terms of its properties (Figure 1). A set
of alphabets can carry Table 1. Property acquisition by
non-living matter (abiomeme) based on structure-code concept.
Building block Meme Software Function Alphabet Word
English Meaning Element Molecule Abioprogram
PropertiesNote: Atom is taken as the unit of matter for
convenience in illustrating the principle. Figure 1.
Representation of chemical structures as abiomemes. meaning only
if it has affiliation with a language. The meaning of a word
depends on its alphabetic composition as well as the order in
which they are arranged. Two words may be different in their
alphabetic composition or in their arrangements. For instance,
English words “nest” and “sent” have the same alphabets but
different arrangements whereas the words “take” and “buy” are
different in their alphabetic composition. Likewise, different
chemical structures are formed based on the compoition and
arrangement of the atoms of the elements. The structures of
nbutane and iso-butane have the same elements and same number of
atoms with the chemical formula of C4H10; but the arrangement of
the atoms is different in the two substances. These two
structures correspond to English words “nest” and “sent”. The
chemical structures of water (H2O) and benzene (C6H6) are
different in their elemental (alphabet) composition. They are
comparable with English words “take” and “buy” (Figure 1). By
this analogy, the phenomenon of how chemical structures
(substances) acquire their properties based on the divine
abioprogram can be explained. Periodicity in the properties of
elements which provide the basis for their classification
(Periodic Table) and also for the prediction of properties of a
hitherto unknown element; specificity in the change of
properties of a substance with a change in structure, etc., are
clearly the clauses of the abioprogram operating at different
levels of structural hierarchy. Recognition of at least some of
these rules is now helping us in the search for new compounds
with specific properties. For instance, computeraided molecular
modelling (CAMM) has become a powerful tool for studying
virtually any chemical structure. The method works on the
reverse logic of structure-property relationships. In this case,
we specify the properties; the computer will give us the
structure of the molecule in return. Use of this technique in
the search for new drugs has enabled the researchers to cut
short the long list of candidate molecules to a smaller number
expected to have the required biological activity. In fact by
studying the structure-property relationships, we are
deciphering the abioprogram at various hierarchal levels of the
universe. The chemical structure may be thus likened to a kind
of algorithm conforming to the abioprogram. The universe is
therefore nothing but information laden system. 3.2 Biomemetics
Biomemetics is science of biological information. Bio-systems
carry divine instructions in a different way. “Breathing of
rooh” into a clay model to create man (Adam) mentioned in the
Quran (Q. 15:26-29) and “breathing of life” mentioned in the
Bible (Genesis 2:7) refer to one and the same event –
installation of divine biosoftware in a clay model of man. Upon
installation of the rooh (the term nafs is also used in the
Quran in the context of man) in that non-living clay model, it
sprang to life much like a lifeless computer springs to “life”
when software is installed. Software is the invisible soul of a
computer. Similarly, the invisible soul of an organism is its
biosoftware. The Scriptural revelations make clear distinction
between the way in which God’s instructions (programs) are
carried by the non-living and living components of the universe.
The Quran further informs us that it is the removal (or in
computer parlance, “deletion”) of the nafs (biosoftware of human
being) that causes death (Q. 6:93). In other words, a dead body
is like a computer without software. A system is said to be
“living” if it carries software. Therefore the phenomenon of
life can be defined as the manifestation of the execution of the
program. Going by this definition, all the so called non-living
and living systems are in reality “living systems” in their own
right as they do carry divine programs. The physical universe is
in reality a “living system” as it operates on the abioprogram.
We may distinguish the so called “living” and “non-living”
systems as two different forms of life as they are operated on
different software. However, we shall retain the conventional
terms “living” and “non-living” for convenience. Computer,
robot, etc., are also living systems as they work on manmade
programs. We may distinguish them as forms of “artificial life”.
4. Organism－Natural Biocomputer or Biorobot An
organism is a biocomputer or biorobot depending on its
configuration. The biological program (bioprogram) at the level
of the species is termed microbioprogram. Mi-crobioprogram at
the level of the member of a species is termed biomemome. Cell
is biochip, the organisational unit of the biosystem. The cell
has both hardware and biosoftware. The hardware is produced in
the cell as per the program appropriate to execute the program.
The chemical structures (including DNA) in the cell consti-tute
the hardware while biosoftware is stored on the chromosomes as
invisible information. At the level of the organism, tissues and
organs make the hardware. A distinguishing feature of the
bioprogram from abio-program is that while abioprogram is
encoded by the structure, bioprogram requires a physical medium
for its storage as in our computer. The chromosomes in the body
cells serve as the storage device (hard disk) of the biosystem.
The arrangement of biomemes on the chro-mosomes, i.e.,
biomemory organization may be viewed as the “biomemogram” of a
species (Figure 2). Although we may get some broad idea of
memetic allocation on the chromosomes (e.g., allelic loci) by
studying the in-heritance pattern of characters through breeding
trials, it is not possible to map out their storage pattern on
the biomemory. A memory sector on the chromosome may Sectors
Centromere Figure 2. Biomemory organization on a chromosome.
Note: The chromosome (biomemory) is divided into many sectors.
be storing one or more biomemes that constitute the pro-gram for
a specific biological activity or function. It is the totality
of the biomemetic package that makes the biomemome of the
individual. An organism may be unichipped, i.e., unicellular
(e.g., bacteria) or multichipped, i.e., multicellular (e.g.,
plants, animals). Multicellular organisms like animals are
functionally comparable with man-made robots. They can be
categorised as biorobots as they are totally programmed
unconscious biosystems. On the other hand man can be described
as the conscious, intelligent, freewilled robot of God in the
light of the Quranic revelations [1,2]. God created man to
serve Him. Man is addressed by God as “abd” meaning servant (Q.
51:56). The Arabic word abd is synonymous with the English word
“robot” (servant). The root of this word may be traced to the
Czech play Rossum’s Universal Roboters of the 1920s in which
human workers were portrayed as “robots” (ro-bota in
Czechoslovakian means servitude). In this con-text it may be
mentioned that an understanding of God’s purpose of creation of
man and the universe is very much necessary to comprehend the
overall mission of God. This aspect has been discussed in detail
elsewhere [2]. Robot is a programmed dedicated machine designed
to perform certain desired tasks. It is essentially a computer
with three additional features namely, sensors (which receives
data from the environment), microprocessors (which transform
data into information) and actuators (or muscles, which control
the energy requirement). An animal biorobot with sensory organs
and brain (the loca-tion of CPU) is comparable with man-made
robot but God’s human robot is far beyond that level of
sophistica-tion. Man is bestowed with an additional processor,
qalb (mind), which is capable of conscious perception of the
world and has the freedom to take decision and act. Sev-eral
functions of human qalb are identified in the Quran.
All of them are cases of conscious perception. The qalb is the
part that thinks (i.e., processing information) and learns (Q.
22:46), and understands (Q. 7:179). The Quran further reveals
that the faculties of hearing, seeing, un-derstanding and
feeling are made only for human species. “Say: It is He (Allah)
who created you and made for you the faculties of hearing,
seeing, feeling and understand-ing; little thanks it is you
give.” (Q. 67:23). These facul-ties are associated with the qalb
(human mind), which is responsible for the conscious perception
of the world. The Quran also reveals that these faculties are
absent in animals although they have eyes and ears (Q. 7:179;
25:44). Clearly animals are totally programmed uncon-scious
biorobots like man-made robots. The role of mind comes in the
execution of the con-scious activities; that is, activity
decided and/or executed by the mind is a conscious activity.
Similarly any signal received through input ports (Figure 3) and
processed by mind results in conscious perception. Consider the
visual perception. Eye is the input port for electromagnetic
ra-diation. It receives the radiation signal from outside, does
the preliminary processing and then transmits it to the brain
location concerned to decode its information con-tent. The human
mind decodes it in accordance with the biosoftware and creates
its translated version. For exam-ple, let us say we are looking
at a red object. This means that the object in reality is
emitting or reflecting electro-magnetic radiation in the 650-700
nm wavelength range. This radiation enters our eyes and its
information is de-ciphered by our mind in accordance with our
biosoftware to perceive it as red. In other words the object has
no colour; the colour of the object is generated inside our
brain. If our biosoftware stipulates blue colour for that
wavelength range, we would have seen that object as blue. Our
biosoftware also prescribes limits to our percep-tional
potentials. For example, our visual perception is restricted to
within 400-700 nm wavelength range. Therefore we cannot see
X-rays and gamma rays because their wavelengths are outside of
the limits set by our biosoftware in spite of the fact they also
belong to the same form of energy, electromagnetic radiation.
Our au-ditory perception is within the sound wave frequency
range of about 12-20000 Hz outside of which we cannot hear and
so on. It also assigns thresholds and maxima for each kind of
sensory perception. For example, for a sound wave to become
audible to us it should have a minimum intensity. There is also
a maximum level be-yond which our perception of sound will not
be enhanced. In other words, human mind is unable to create
tangible image to any signal that falls outside of the limits
pre-scribed by the biosoftware. This implies two things; one is
that the world around us is inherently soundless, col-ourless,
shapeless and tasteless. It is the human mind that creates these
characteristics based on the biosoftware and Input ports CPU
Memory Commands Organs Animal biorobot Memory CPU Human
biorobot Input ports Qalb (Mind) Sadr (Memory)
Commands Organs Figure 3. Contrast between animal and human
biorobot systems. imparts them to the outside world; and the
other is that it is our biosoftware that determines what to
perceive and how to perceive. Obviously, many forms of energy
re-main unperceived by us. This is the realm of the un-known
(intangible), which the Quran describes as “ghayb” (in the
computer jargon, virtual). The realm of the known or that
perceived (tangible) by man is re-ferred to in the Quran as
“shahadat”. God alone has the knowledge of both the intangible
and the manifest (Q. 59:22). The dichotomy of ghayb and shahadat
is rele-vant only in the human context. The fact that conscious
perception of the world is determined by human bio-software and
that energy (information) does exist out-side of the domain of
human perception indicates the existence of the intangible. As
in animal biorobot, the CPU of human system is responsible for
the house-keeping activities, i.e., internal biological
activities that sustain the system. In addition to mind, human
robot also has sadr (memory), where the conscious activities are
recorded and stored. Cerebellum is thought to be a likely
location of sadr in the light of certain Quranic verses [2]. The
information stored in sadr in fact forms the dossier of
conscious activities (in-cluding the acquired data and
information) carried out by mind during the life of a person
(for evaluation by God in the hereafter). The mechanism of
storage could be identical to that of biosoftware storage on the
chromosome. Characterisation of biological information as
non-particulate biomemes is opposed to the current particu-late
concept of biological information. Biologists do not distinguish
biological information from chemical infor-mation but believe
the DNA molecule (the gene) encodes biological information also.
That is, the genome (the to-tality of the genes) structure
besides having its physical and chemical properties also encodes
the biological pro-gram of the organism. In effect, molecular
biologists are superimposing biological information over
chemical in-formation literally making the molecule an entangled
web of contrasting information. The computer model of the
organism adopts Wilhelm Johannsen’s non-physical gene concept.
This concept agrees well with the Quranic and the Biblical
revelation of intangible biosoftware. The computer model permits
us to define the phenomena of life and death while in biology
(the science of life), which is based on the particulate gene,
it has not been possible to define these phenomena. While
proposing the concept of gene in 1909, Wilhelm Johannsen
cautioned against two things. One was against considering the
gene for a particular character, which implied that the genetic
program should be viewed as an integrated program, and the other
was against treating the gene as particulate [12]. Both these
warnings have since proved correct. Today in the era of
genomics, biologists are unable to define what the gene is and
attribute genes for different characters. [13]. Particulate gene
had never been the idea of early geneticists. The scientific
community was, however, not comfortable with a hypothetical
non-material entity having a “metaphysical” aura around it. Thus
with the elucidation of the double helical struc-ture of DNA and
confirmation of its role in protein syn-thesis, the non-physical
gene metamorphosed into physical gene. The molecular gene was
born that way.
5. Natural Biosoftware Engineering Mechanisms Natural
biosoftware engineering mechanisms provide the tool to create
diverse bimemomes. Since the biomemes are stored on the
chromosome in sectors, qualitative and quantitative changes in
bioinformation can be brought about by shifting, adding,
deleting and shuffling the sec-tors. The role of transposable
elements is crucial in many of these mechanisms. The
bioinformation content of a cell as a whole can also be altered
by increasing or decreasing the number of chromosomes. There are
also mechanisms for multiplication of the cells as well as for
eliminating the unwanted chromosomes or chromosome sectors. We
find a variety of natural biosoftware engi-neering mechanisms in
operation that can do all these and more. Some of these are:
crossing over during meio-sis (gamete formation),
non-disjunction of sister chromatids during mitosis and meiosis
leading to increase in chromosome number, the so-called
chromosomal aberrations such as deletion, duplication inversion
or insertion of chromosome sectors, etc. Although these
phenomena are generally treated as errors or mistakes by
biologists, they in fact form powerful molecular tools to
produce radically different chromosome compositions and hence
bioinformation content. All these processes viewed in the light
of the computer concept are biosoftware-driven phenomena and not
mistakes. It is these biosoftware en-gineering processes that
produce biomemetic variability and hence phenotypic diversity in
the offspring as pro-grammed.
6. Developmental Biology Another area where the computer
concept of the organ-ism throws light is developmental biology.
It has not been possible to explain based on the molecular gene
how anatomically and functionally different tissues de-velop.
Until recently, it was thought that mitosis (a kind of cell
division) taking place during development of an individual from
zygote produces daughter cells with identical genomes. A recent
finding that different tissues carry different genomes [14,15]
called into question the current belief. The biomemetic concept
adopted in the computer model however enables us to explain the
phe-nomenon of ontogenetic development of an individual in
conformity with this discovery [2]. Let us examine the
development of a human individual from zygote based on the
biomemetic concept An important feature of the biomemome is that
it pro-duces a dynamic phenotype that is changing continuously
from time zero (the time at which say a zygote starts
de-veloping) to its death. The biomemome is thus an inte-grated
program deciding the phenome (phenotype) at every instant. The
biomemome, in simple terms, is an integrated biological program
of an individual. Devel-opment of an individual is just one
phase in the continu-ous execution of the biomemome of the
individual. De-velopment of an individual presents the scenario
of cre-ating tissues (or group of cells) with different tasks
as-signed to them. This is achieved through mitotic cell
di-vision. Mitotic division is not mere copying or
multipli-cation of cells as is believed now. Although the entire
biomemome stored in the zygote (the biomemome of the individual)
is copied into the daughter cells during mito-sis, it can be
assumed that the process also assigns to the resulting cells a
set of biomemes to be in operation in each of them. In this way,
differentiation of the operable biomemes progresses as dictated
by the biomemome culminating in the formation of tissues. The
set of oper-able biomemes in a given tissue may be designated as
its “operamome”. The hardware (including DNA) of the cells of a
tissue is synthesized to suit the functions of the operamome.
This is reflected in the differences in the cell structures
among the tissues. For example, a muscle cell is structurally
and functionally different from a nerve cell, neuron. They both
carry identical biomemomes but dif-ferent operamomes. Thus, even
though all the cells carry the biomemome of the individual, the
operamome varies with tissue. An example of visible
manifestation of operamomic transistion in the phenotype is the
metamorphosis of lar-va into butterfly. The biomemome of the
organism cre-ates the butterfly phenotype through a selective
switching on and switching off of biomemes. As a result,
different sets of biomemes (operamomes) come into operation
creating a butterfly from a totally different phenotype, larva.
7. The Abiomeme-Biomeme Interactions Phenotype is the product
of biosoftware-environment interaction. Although the importance
of environment in moulding the phenotype is recognized, the
actual rela-tionship between the two is not well understood.
This can be explained convincingly through biomemetic approach.
Not all the biomemes of an operamome in a tissue are in
operation at any given instant as in the case of instruc-tions
carried in our computer program. Only those bio-memes required
at that instant are in operation. The oth-ers are silent. A
latent biomeme comes into operation at the time stipulated in
the program (e.g., development of sexual characters at puberty)
or when the situation (e.g., environmental stress condition)
warrants. Thus we can say the biomemes in operation in summer
are not the same as those operate in winter. If a person spends
some time in a hot place and then enters an air-conditioned
room, the operamome will also change accordingly as specified in
the biomemome. The environmental condi-tion thus acts as switch
for the right biomemes (if avail-able) to come into play. When
an insecticide is sprayed against a pest in a crop field, and if
the pest has the bio-memetic package that can resist its harmful
effect, the chemical will act as stimulus to turn on those
biomemes which in turn will confer protection to the organism
against that chemical. The consequence of this memetic operation
is “resistance development” in the pest against that chemical.
Although the biomemetic package has been present in the organism
all the while, it has not been in operation as the situation
warranting its role has not arisen until then. Consequently, the
cell may not be hav-ing the necessary hardware or it may have to
modify some available hardware for execution of such rarely
executed programs. Nevertheless when the situation arises for
the biomemetic package to come into operation, it requires the
right hardware for its execution. Therefore the cell synthesizes
the necessary hardware (any structure including DNA) or modifies
the existing hardware ac-cording to the program to make way for
the execution of the newly turned-on memes. It is such events
that in fact biologist refer to as “cell-induced mutagenesis”.
There are several reports relating to this phenomenon, which
cannot be explained based on particulate gene concept but can be
convincingly explained biomemetically. A couple of examples are
given here. Miroslav Radman, a molecular geneticist at the
Uni-versite Rene Descartes in Paris, discovered the phe-nomenon
of cell-directed mutagenesis in 1970. He showed that bacteria
harboured a genetic program to make mutations. At that time, no
one believed this he-retical proposal [16]. Many biologists were
skeptical about this discovery because genetic mutation was
con-sidered as a random phenomenon. Although the discov-ery of a
new group of DNA-synthesizing enzymes (po-lymerases) as the
generator of mutations in times of stress [16] gave credence to
Radman’s finding, it was the work of Cairns et al. that
galvanized the critics. In 1988 molecular biologist John Cairns
and his colleagues at the Harvard School of Public Health
reported induced muta-tions of various elements of the lac
operon changes in Escherichia coli bacteria [17]. Their results
showed that bacteria could induce specific mutations depending
on their environmental conditions. But unfortunately these
discoveries were sidelined. A recent report of resistance of
bacteria to antibiotics also provides evidence of cell-induced
mutation. Commenting on the work of Ko-hanski et al. [18],
Martin Enserink writes: “Traditionally, the development of
antibiotic resistance—a big and growing problem in medicine—has
been seen as a pas-sive phenomenon. Haphazard mutations occur in
bacte-rial genomes, and bacteria randomly swap genetic
ele-ments. Every now and then, a mutation or a bit of newly
acquired DNA enables the microbes to detoxify antibiot-ics, pump
them out of the cells, or render them harmless in another way.
When these microbes are exposed to antibiotics, natural
selection will allow them to outcom-pete the ones that aren’t
resistant. But in the past 6 years, a different view has
emerged, says microbiologist Jesْs Blلzquez of the
Spanish National Research Council in Madrid. Researchers have
discovered that mutation rates in bacteria sometimes go up in
response to stress, in some cases promoting resistance. And
studies by Blلz- quez and others have shown that the
antibiotics them-selves can cause this phenomenon, called
hypermutabil-ity”[19]. Although against the particulate gene
concept, the above reports are clear evidence of the existence
of bio-logical information in the cell itself to bring about
nec-essary mutations at times of need. In the computer model of
the organism, the changes in DNA are merely changes in the
hardware like the change in any other cell structure. It is the
biosoftware of the organism stored on the chro-mosomes, that
brings about these changes or creates new structures (including
DNA) so as to provide necessary hardware. In all these cases
depending on the stimuli or signals received from the
environment, specific biomemes are triggered into operation. Not
all organisms will respond similarly to a given stress or
environmental condition. An organism can react to an
environmental condition only as directed by its biomemome. This
would imply that all phenomic changes that occur in an organ-ism
are biomemome-directed phenomena from within the cell and not
externally induced as is believed now. These may also be taken
as instances of abioprogram-bioprogram interactions. The
availability of biomemes to counter environmental stresses
including the kind of resistance development is a natural
evidence of God’s designing the organism to meet the requirement
in His scheme of things. These instances illustrate that
heritable changes (mutations) that occur in an organism are
biosoft-ware-induced and not by the action of any extraneous
mutagen.
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author: Prof, P.A. Wahid
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