THE PARADOX OF CHOICE 



Choice for Work in Genetics 



But here some favorable signs are already appearing. The 

 realization is growing that in so complex a system as living 

 matter there must be some special communication and control 

 facility. Also, a further sort of recognition that Professor von 

 Neumann's teleological research is particularly appropriate in 

 this field has led to exciting and stimulating connections be- 

 tween information theory and the structure and reproducing 

 capacity of living matter. Claude Shannon's dramatic formula- 

 tion of the information content of events and the related con- 

 cepts of the control of events by Professor Norbert Wiener 

 provided general theories going far beyond the ingenious but 

 specific treatments of signal theory and coding produced earlier. 

 Perhaps once more it was this very quality of a unifying theory 

 which attracted many scholars remote from communications 

 science. As diverse but individualistic interests as represented 

 by an astrophysicist (Gamow) and other mathematical and 

 physical scientists have begun to show how subtle sequences of 

 amino acids, which apparently endow protein with their high 

 individualities and specialized functions, could be arranged by 

 synthesis contraposed to ribonucleic acid chains. It is now 

 believed that three or more like nucleotide residues can fix by 

 an understandable coding scheme the position of each particular 

 amino acid selected for the sequence desired. The protein then 

 produced from such sequential combination would presumably 

 be the characteristic protein for the special function, which on a 

 higher level, of course, might also be the special function of 

 reproduction of the whole organism itself. 



Thus smoothly and quickly have some of the deepest 

 theories of this present time moved from telephony and com- 

 munications interests to genetics and familial interests. With a 

 span like this an individual wishing to work in the field accord- 



63 



