Evolution of Intelligence (Origins)

by dhw, Sunday, March 31, 2013, 16:57 (4041 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Tony mounted a scathing attack on my 'panpsychist' hypothesis as being dependent on randomness and competition. I have (with patient forbearance!) pointed out that on the contrary, the whole hypothesis is based on "intelligence" and cooperation.-TONY: No one has overlooked cooperation.-Then I wonder why you only mentioned randomness and competition.
 
TONY: The problem is that cooperation does not explain the unity of the design, not to mention exponentially complicating the issue of 'first intelligence' by making it happen not once, but numerous times.-Design entails different elements combining into a functioning unit. Cooperation between cells enables organs to function, cooperation between ants enables an ant colony to function, cooperation between wolves enables a pack to function, cooperation between citizens enables a society to function, cooperation between the flower and the bumble bee (a marvellous post, by the way, also illustrating "intelligent energy" at work within the materials) enables both to survive and flourish. Cooperation is the essence of the unity of design. And it happens not once but zillions and zillions of times over, because without it there could be no life. -You wrote: "The Genome is a chunk of code that reacts the way that it is programmed to react." Does this mean your God individually programmes cells, ants, wolves, citizens, flowers and bumble bees to cooperate? Or are you saying that he invented a mechanism which would enable them all to work out their own particular designs?
 
As regards 'first intelligence', I look forward very much to hearing your own hypothesis as to how a single entity of mindless energy might have acquired it.-****-I'm shifting the following discussion from "Trilobite eyes", to avoid duplicating arguments. Perhaps we can confine "Trilobite eyes" to evolution itself.-DHW: What seems unreasonable, and therefore unimaginable to me, is the concept of first-cause energy being a single, super-colossal, eternally and fully self-aware, undesigned mind inexplicably possessing all the information there could possibly be, whereas our puny minds require a designer. -TONY: One mind possessing all information is not a stretch when you think that 'in the beginning' there was so much less information to possess!- Hence my question to you about how your possibly mindless first-cause energy might have acquired its intelligence. "Initially" there could have been no information, apart from its mindless existence, so where did the information come from to give rise to its intelligence, and for its intelligence to acquire?-TONY: Your mind is based on biochemistry with the addition of energy. Because of the physical components and required support system it is greatly more complex and yet more inefficient than a mind made of pure energy. That would be why your mind requires a designer, but the mind made of pure energy would not.-The energy in my mind is acquiring information all the time by its interplay with matter and with other energies. That is why I am suggesting that a single, pure energy would have nothing to learn. Hence my questions.-TONY: The idea of cells having some level of intelligence or awareness is not something that I really disagree with. But trying to extrapolate that idea backwards to the creation of everything is just too much of a stretch because of what goes back that far is at once so mind boggling in its complexity and so elegant at the same time. I see the design of a single creative genius, because anything else would have created discrepancies that would unravel it all. If it were left to random chance or willy nilly individuals choosing to perhaps cooperate and perhaps not, none of us would be having this discussion. There is a near impossibly strong underlying theme to this orchestra. Just because I can not see the composer does not mean I can not read the score and recognize that it has been written by a single hand.-We have no idea how many "discrepancies" occurred before this universe and this Earth settled into their mind-boggling complexity and elegance. I like the analogy of the orchestra, and if I believed in God, I would see him as the ultimate artist/writer/composer, as well as the ultimate scientist. However, you are once again distorting my alternative hypothesis: it is not left to random chance or willy-nilly individuals to cooperate. In my scenario, energy mindlessly forms matter, and instead of energy becoming aware of nothing in particular, it becomes aware of the changing matter it is embedded in. You can if you like say it's lucky that individual "intelligences" were disposed to cooperate in the creation of life (and continue to do so). But then I can say it's lucky that your eventually intelligent God was disposed to creating life instead of spending eternity contemplating his energy. All we know is that life has resulted from cooperation. Whether that was directed by a single "intelligence" outside matter or by individual "intelligences" inside matter is pure speculation.