When cells do it, it is called allostery:
Traditional lighting is wired physically, but smart lights can be controlled by wireless communications from a server (although they still need electrical wiring to the grid). The light and the switch did not “evolve” to connect; remote control shows that the signal and response required advance planning…
Cells perform remote control, too, using diverse methods. Since Evolution News addressed the subject of allostery four years ago, more interesting examples have been discovered. And like the 2016 example showed, remote control adds another layer of specificity to molecular machine design. “Allostery is a fundamental element of complex macromolecular function,” the authors of today’s first example explain, “representing the essential process by which events occurring at one site are transmitted to distal sites to regulate activity.” …
Bypassing the evolutionary language in this paper, what is most noteworthy is the extraordinary degree of allosteric cooperation in this RNA molecule. Remember that RNAs tend to be floppier than proteins. And yet the high-fidelity cooperative action between the RNA and protein parts in the ribosome require allostery over vast distances (on the cellular scale). This is astonishing. How can they believe this level of remote control just happened? Evolution News, “Allostery: How Cells Do Remote Control” at Evolution News and Science Today:
It’s not so much that they believe it but they dare not question it. Academic riots don’t involve bloodshed. More like Cancelcide. Career-icide, for want of a better word.
See also: Researchers: Proofreading proteins prevent DNA errors. It’s not enough that DNA is a language but now it has proofreaders? Keep moving along, folks, no design to see here…