How can we, from the point of view of statistical physics, reconcile the facts that the gene structure seems to involve only a comparatively small number of atoms and nevertheless displays a most regular and lawful activity with a durability that borders upon the miraculous?

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• The number of atoms involved in the responsible gene structure is likely to be very small, yet it displays a most regular and lawful activity with a durability that borders upon the miraculous, remaining unperturbed by the disordering tendency of heat motion for centuries.claim0.895
  Schrödinger's statement of the puzzle that quantum mechanics resolves.
• If the gene is a large molecule with discrete quantum states and high energy barriers between isomeric configurations, then it will exhibit long-term stability and rare spontaneous mutations.hypothesis0.812
  The core predictive hypothesis derived from Delbrück's model.
• If X-rays produce mutations by energetic single events (ionization), then their efficiency should not depend on the gene's spontaneous mutability.hypothesis0.791
  Another testable hypothesis about mutation induction.
• The genome does not merely specify chemical structures to be assembled but also specifies complex patterns of interaction between molecular structures required to produce controlled behaviours of the individual organism.claim0.788
  An extension of the genetic code concept: it encodes developmental and behavioural control, not just static form.
• Such middle-range order appears, without fail, in biological structures of all sorts, again making it virtually certain that there must be a predictable process which can create such order, and which does create it reliably in biological cases.claim0.787
  Claims middle-range order is universal in biology and implies a reliable generative process exists
• Individual mechanical explanations for each property are too specific to provide a general explanation for why living structure repeatedly appears across all domains.claim0.785
  Alexander's argument that case-by-case mechanical explanations fail to address the universal recurrence of living structure
• Newtonian mechanics augmented by statistical mechanics cannot explain chemical bond stability or genetic persistence; quantum mechanics is necessary.claim0.782
• How can molecular gene structures preserve detailed specifications across generations despite thermal noise and copying errors?question0.778
  Core biological question motivating Schrödinger's entire theoretical effort; answered via quantum mechanics.