Cell response to electric field (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, April 03, 2013, 18:11 (4253 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Cells move away from charges and toward charges. They are not thinking but using electrical attraction:-"The most likely explanation, they conclude, is that the electric field causes certain electrically charged proteins in the cell membrane to concentrate at the membrane edge, triggering a response"-http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130328125100.htm-No evidence of pan-psychism here.-QUOTE: "Damage to tissue sets up a "short circuit," changing the flux direction and creating an electrical field that leads cells into the wound. But exactly how and why does this happen? That's unclear."-QUOTE: "We know that cells can respond to a weak electrical field, but we don't know how they sense it," said Min Zhao, professor of dermatology and ophthalmology and a researcher at UC Davis' stem cell center, the Institute for Regenerative Cures. "If we can understand the process better, we can make wound healing and tissue regeneration more effective."-There are two things to note here. Firstly, my panpsychist hypothesis is concerned especially with innovation. As I've said before, once a winning formula has been found, the cells will automatically stick to it, e.g. March 22 at 12.34 under "Trilobite eyes": "Every innovation is a departure from automatic behaviour, and only when a successful formula has been found will the chemicals and cells behave like automatons, which is why we only see them as such." This was also the point of the Talbott quote attacking the concept of what he calls "automatisms" as the root of genetic variation leading to evolutionary change.-Secondly, however, when cells (like ants and bees) are required to perform their particular tasks, we have no way of knowing to what extent they're using some kind of "intelligence"(see McClintock). According to the above quotes, the researchers still don't know how and why the cells behave as they do, or how they sense the weak field. The scientists are trying to "understand the process better". No evidence of panpsychism, and no evidence against panpsychism. Why assume that the "most likely explanation" is correct when even the researchers admit they don't understand what's going on? -Theists and atheists alike use the same subjective approach to all the major questions: the "most likely" explanation is the one they believe in. I'm not claiming that my panpsychist proposal is even likely. But I'm not going to abandon it in favour of the various god/chance proposals, just because different people think their own equally improbable hypotheses are the "most likely"!