Intelligence & Evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, November 06, 2013, 19:29 (4033 days ago) @ David Turell

DHW: However, it's always worth remembering that 90% of biochemists in general reject your theory of divine preprogramming!
DAVID: Because they have faith in atheism.-A strange way of putting it. I would say they do not have faith in a self-aware eternal God for whose existence there is no scientific evidence. Perhaps they have faith that one day they will discover a material solution to our mysteries. But more to the point, they are professionals working in a field which you claim provides the basis for your own faith. A 90% no is not much of an endorsement, is it?-Dhw: I have considered three hypotheses, all of which start with biochemical reality (cells must cooperate in the production of new organs), look at the results of evolution, and extrapolate a reasonable but unsubstantiated explanation.-DAVID: You persist in missing the point. Cells do not, of their own volition cooperate. They are forced to follow an organizational plan in the DNA they are given.-If you mean that cells follow a plan devised BY a mechanism of unknown origin within their DNA, we might strike a deal, but if you mean the plan has been placed there by your God and cells are automatons (which of course you have always maintained), you are missing my point, which is quite simply that we DO NOT KNOW. This is admirably illustrated by your misinterpretation of the sentence you bolded in one of the three quotations supporting the concept or at least the possibility of the intelligent cell. The sentence begins: "Though the researchers do not understand the process(es) by which bacteria code messages and send them...."-Your comment: "...the cells work by biochemical code processes, as in the bolded sentence above." That is the MEANS of communication (like us using voices, birds singing, bees dancing, ants using chemicals etc.), but the researchers don't understand how they do the coding and messaging. Do you understand the processes by which your brain and body translate your thoughts into spoken or written words? The researchers do argue, however, that it implies a shared knowledge of the semantic meanings, which suggests that bacteria are sentient (by choosing), intelligent (by communicating) and socially organized. Of course you prefer not to "bold" that.-I quoted Margulis, who says intelligence is "an intrinsic property of cells". You commented: "It is part of the Gaia Earth philosophy to which Margulis was a worshipper." She clarifies her views on Gaia in the interview, which is on
 
www.astrobio.net/interview/2111/bacterial-intelligence (I got one digit wrong yesterday.)-You rightly complain when atheists dismiss ID science because the scientists believe in God, but you sink precisely to that level when you dismiss Margulis's research on cells by ridiculing her support for aspects of the Gaia hypothesis. (Why "worshipper" anyway? She rejects Lovelock's idea that Earth is a superorganism, and replaces it with "ecosystem".) You should consider her research on cells and her conclusion in the context only of her science.