Maybe I’m misreading your tone, but I’m not trying to argue with you - I’m genuinely curious about this and if you have superior knowledge I’m open!
My understanding from a quick skim of Wikipedia citations suggests we understand what’s involved (particles and receptors) but the actual mechanism around encoding of signals seems to be theory.
We also can’t teach a computer to think, but we still have quite a good idea of how it works.
Redfox8@mander.xyz 5 weeks ago
I believe the receptor cell responds to a particular part of the molecule in question. Artificial flavourings and scents have identical (or similar enough) parts to trigger the same response, but are otherwise different molecules.
Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
I think someone said the number of combinations for a key and lock receptor was insurmountable. Don’t quote me.