Convergence or divergence? (Introduction)

by dhw, Saturday, September 14, 2013, 17:22 (4088 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: So let me ask you again whether you would accept that cells (and ants) are intelligent, with the proviso that your God invented their intelligence and occasionally guides it.-DAVID: To repeat: God gave the cells and ants information and generally automatic responses to received information. This is not really intelligence. The ant looks for landmarks to find his way home to the nest. This has been shown. Does he automatically respond to the landmark or does he proceed with some thought? My guess is it is all automatic. He processed a memory of landmarks and responded to them to return. This is not intelligence. -Information means nothing without a mechanism that processes and uses it. I have cited the ants' complex strategy to kill the invading mantis as an example of planning, solving problems, meaningful communication, adapting to changing situations ... all of which suggest intelligent use of information. You have dismissed that example as one of Nature's inexplicable wonders. You prefer to draw on an obvious example of instinctive use of information (the foal suckling), and now a borderline one of direction finding, which would also apply just as much to humans as to ants. As someone who, in the words of my wife, "couldn't find his way out of a paper bag", I too would prefer not to think of direction finding as a matter of intelligence! There is a glimmer of hope in your qualification "generally automatic responses" and "not really intelligence". My focus lies on those responses (like the mantis episode) that are not automatic and which have the attributes of "real" intelligence listed above. For further examples of ant intelligence, please read:- http://quotations.hubpages.com/hub/Intelligent_Ants-DAVID: On the other hand, reported in the last couple days, orangutans appear to plan out the next day's travel. Higher organisms have a degree of intelligence, no doubt.-We have long since agreed on that. And I am suggesting that ants and ... of vital importance to the history of evolution ... cells also have the ability (no doubt on a different scale) to plan, solve problems etc. Why do you refuse to call this ability intelligence, even with the proviso that God invented it? Ah, such stubbornness! Won't you at least adopt an agnostic stance on the subject rather than keep repeating baseless assumptions?