These remind me of something.

Although living systems obey the laws of physics and chemistry, the notion of function or purpose differentiates biology from other natural sciences.

To describe biological functions, we need a vocabulary that contains concepts such as amplification, adaptation, robustness, insulation, error correction and coincidence detection.

A number of the design principles of biological systems are familiar to engineers. Positive feedback loops can drive rapid transitions between two different stable states of a system, and negative feedback loops can maintain an output parameter within a narrow range, despite widely fluctuating input. Coincidence detection systems require two or more events to occur simultaneously in order to activate an output. Amplifiers are built to minimize noise relative to signal, for instance by choosing appropriate time constants for the circuits. Parallel circuits (fail-safe systems) allow an electronic device to survive failures in one of the circuits.
Designs such as these are common in biology.

From molecular to modular cell biology
Leland H. Hartwell, John J. Hopfield, Stanislas Leibler and Andrew W. Murray

Here

HT:Rock

Richard Dawkins writes:

Arthur C. Clarke, who died last month, said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." If we could land a jumbo jet beside a medieval village, would we not be worshiped as gods? The technology of interstellar travel, and the scientific knowledge on which it would be based, are as far beyond us as our present-day knowledge surpasses that of Dark Age peasants.

Indeed. This is why it is significant that looking at the cell is like looking into the future of our own designs. But it also undersores the limitations of Analogy, as we could be using a much more primitive technology (ours) to help us grasp a much more sophisticated technology (life).

Dawkins adds:

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I came across an old textbook entitled, The Principles of Heredity. It was written by geneticist Laurence H. Snyder and published in 1935 (Boston, New York [etc.] D.C. Heath and company). The book was intended as a text for "the beginning student of heredity." The textbook has a chapter on Eugenics that provides us a glimpse of one portion of our American and scientific history. Given that this material was being taught to students, I've transcribed this chapter and offer it merely as a service for those interested in the history of eugenics.

Here

Our semi-annoying, semi-enlightening commenter and sometimes contributor Thought Provoker has spent the better part of the past week valiantly attempting to defend Charles Darwin from Ben Stein's charge in the movie Expelled that Darwinism led to eugenics, and eugenics led to Adolph Hitler's eugenics laws, which led to… The Holocaust.

I admit to sensitivity on this issue, as both my Godparents were Jews, very recent immigrants from Europe. Both of them had tattoos and had lost their entire families in the Holocaust. They never had any children of their own. Can you guess why? So I got 'indoctrinated' very young in the importance of what Never Again! means.

My husband's Aunt Melba (still spry but blind at 96) was sterilized as an adolescent when she and her sister were dropped off at an orphanage back when being an orphan was considered a symptom of "undesirable genetic inheritance" in America. So both sides of this family have some eugenics horror stories in the family album and a serious commitment to making sure it never happens again.

These family stories are related. Such things were as common when I was growing up as unfortunate survivors of polio and thalidomide babies and radiation-induced cancer clusters from atmospheric bomb testing. What happened to my Godparents had its insidious roots in what happened to Aunt Melba years earlier in Oklahoma. Direct, irrefutable connections, as history amply documents in collections from Cold Spring Harbor to the Holocaust Museum.

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Sea Urchins' Genetics Add To Knowledge Of Cancer, Alzheimer's And Infertility is a Science Daily article reporting that humans and sea urchins share more than 7,000 genes and that this fact may facilitate the treatment of diseases and even cancer. The hope is that mapping the sea urchin genome may lead to a better understanding of gene function which in turn could help treat or even prevent some common human maladies.

Interestingly the article also indicates that although sea urchins lack eyes, ears and a nose they contain genes found in humans which are involved in the function of these sensory organs of ours. It has been claimed by some that a thorough understanding of evolution is essential to the medical treatent of bacterial resistence. Would those holding this view affirm that a thorough understanding of front loading is essential to the study and treatment of human diseases?

All living things depend on proteins. Yet I sometimes wonder just how many people pause to consider just how amazing proteins are. Consider your own body. If you dig deep enough, it's often as if a major organ system is centered around the function of a protein or small subset of proteins. Your muscles? Think of actin and myosin, the contractile proteins. Your brain and nerves? Think of the membrane receptors and channels that generate and transmit electrical signals. Your blood? Think of the hemoglobin that transports oxygen. Your digestive system? Think of the enzymes that break down all the food molecules (which, of course, include proteins). Your bones and joints? Think of collagen that binds things together. Your skin and hair? Think of that tough protein, keratin. Your glands? Think of hormones and the receptors that detect them. Your immune system? Think of the antibodies that guard your body.

See proteins as design material and suddenly you are struck by their immense versatility, as if they represent the ultimate, all-purpose substance for generating function.

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Comments about Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed abound. Expelled the Movie: Opening Night Box Office Exceeds Expectations at Darwinian Fundamentalism has this to say:

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed brought in an estimated $1.2 million on its opening night. Even though it was #14 in terms of number of screens, it was #8 in overall revenue, and #4 in per screen average (among those on the Friday estimate chart). Most box office sites I looked at predicted it would end up with 2.0-2.4 for the whole weekend (Friday to Sunday) with an average of 2.2. It is on track to get at least $3.5 million for the weekend, which would be 60% above expectations.

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Hey, I think the metaphor is deepening.

My wife and I saw Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed tonight. It was worth it. Ben Stein interviewed prominent individuals from both sides of the Intelligent Design issue. The overriding theme of the movie was freedom. Freedom to view questions from all vantage points without retribution. Dembski, Berlinski, Wells, Sternberg, Gonzalez and more from the ID side were interviewed along with Dawkins, Provine, Ruse, Myers and others from the opposing side. I enjoyed Berlinski the most while Provine provided an ample view of the dark side. I was surprised (although I should not be after years of watching internet exchanges) by the obsession of critics with religion and their own philosophical interpretations of it. Religion and science are inversely related according to the simplistic formulation of Myers. More of one necessarily means less of the other.

Dembski made the point that evolution need not be an opposing paradigm to Intelligent Design and Ruse made a comical attempt to explain a crystal based explanation for life's origin. After offering a very abbreviated explanation Ben Stein asked how it works and an exasperated Ruse twice repeated that he already explained it. Crystals and mutations were not enough for either Stein or most of the theater viewers based on their reactions.

Expect the usual charges of dishonesty and a liberal dose of insults from the critics. Ignore it. They spring from motives having nothing to do with science. If you spend a significant amount of time at Telic Thoughts you owe it to yourself to see the movie.