Intelligence & Evolution (Evolution)

by David Turell , Saturday, October 12, 2013, 16:16 (4059 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: The context, however, is that you 'still stick to "aware that you are aware"', plus your insistence that consciousness involves the ability to analyse concepts, formulate new theories, and think abstractly like Higgs. This shows that you do not accept that an organism is conscious unless it has a human level of self-awareness. -You persist in confusing levels of the concept of being 'conscious'. Animals and perhaps plants have a conscious state. They are aware of reality and how to respond to it at basic levels. But they are not aware of being aware, they are not deeply philosophic or analytic or abstract. Once you enter that level now you are discussing consciousness. 
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> dhw: I can only assume you now acknowledge that there are different types of consciousness. Presumably, then, you will accept that an organism which is capable of absorbing, processing, assessing and exchanging information, communicating with other organisms, making decisions and solving problems is conscious, though its consciousness is different from ours and does not involve self-awareness, formulating new theories, or abstract thinking like that of Higgs. -This statement shows your confusion. I have described distinct levels of difference. The word consciousness can only be applied to the state of abstract reasoning I have referred to. Look at the definitions which are generally accepted. This is why the source of the state of consciousness is so hard to handle scientifically. We are at a mental level animals don't achieve, no matter how clever the chimp or the corvid appears to be.
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> dhw: It is not an insistence. I offer it as an alternative hypothesis to the (equally?) dubious hypotheses of random mutations and divine preprogramming.-I view it as grasping at straws. The best view is: if it looks designed, it might well be.
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> dhw: You continue to focus on HOW they communicate instead of considering WHAT they communicate. Evolutionary innovation can only come about if the cells cooperate to combine in new ways. This involves processing and exchanging information, taking decisions, solving problems. There is no way round this, and it is what happens even in your divinely preplanned scenario ... the cells assemble in new combinations, and that means they cooperate etc. The issue is the extent to which they themselves are able to use the information in order to create something new ... much as the first ant colonies were able to create their amazing feats of engineering and architecture. According to your own hypothesis, God preprogrammed every innovation, every decision, into the very first organisms, and perhaps even every environmental change (apart from the occasional dabble), and magically the cells automatically logged onto precisely the right programme (out of billions) at the right time to create legs, lungs and livers. How credible is this?-Responded to above. Cells can't plan their own developmental future.-> 
> dhw: What do you mean by "quantum consciousness", and being "joined by" a universal consciousness? We humans are conscious and are also conscious of being conscious. .... If you really think consciousness is not possible without being "joined by" a universal consciousness (= your God), and a concealed God "creates the reality we have" (as well as "pervading everything"), you might as well say that our own consciousness is actually God's consciousness, and we are automatons capable only of thinking his thoughts. And you might also say that your God is present in every cell, taking all the necessary decisions, and therefore the cell is intelligent because, just like our own, its intelligence IS God.-You supposition for my theory above is quite reasonable, except God has obviously given us free will as the presence of human evil shows. We are not automatons.