Intelligence & Evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, November 30, 2013, 12:25 (4010 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Is it not possible that as a result of their research they [Shapiro, Margulis, Albrecht-Buehler & Co) genuinely believe cells are intelligent?-DAVID: If you look at the following link you will see that cells sence and respond to stimuli by biochemical reactions. They are all set up to be automatic: 
Cell Biochemistry (N.B. Right hand mouse click to open link in a new tab or window)-We also sense and respond to stimuli by biochemical reactions. Diagrams can only illustrate the physical features of the cell/the ant/the human brain. You can't illustrate intelligence any more than you can illustrate God's programme for fire ant rafting. Albrecht-Buehler also illustrates his hypothesis, showing the centrosome and microtubules (subtitled "brain and nerves?"). If human intelligence "emerges" from the interaction of many parts, so might intelligence emerge from the interacting parts of the cell, and from interactions within cell communities. You say cells are set up to be automatic, whereas Shapiro, Margulis et al say they are intelligent. Why should your interpretation carry more weight than theirs? And you still haven't said why you think they are kidding us for the sake of popularity.-DAVID: The form of 'intellligence' they observe is shown in the pdf presented. How evolution did that by chance is very problematic. The systems look like implanted intelligent plans to me.-The pdf explains how cells use chemistry to talk to each other, sense their environment, change their behaviour by exchanging data and coordinating, and make different decisions. It is purely a matter of interpretation whether these actions are controlled by an autonomous intelligence or an implanted programme. You needn't keep flogging the dead horse of chance, as that is not an issue between us. (See below for origin of "the systems".)-dhw: If the whole of the ID community supports your hypothesis [...] why do you have to resort to subjectively interpreted "implications" instead of concrete references?
DAVID: Because when they discuss this approach the pdf presented is the kind of evidence they give.-This kind of evidence shows only that the cell seems too complex not to have been designed. It has nothing to do with your hypothesis that God preprogrammed the first cells to pass on billions...oh well, see below.-dhw: Just give me one reference to an article explicitly arguing that God implanted billions of programmes into the very first cells, to ensure that billions of years later organisms would produce billions of innovations, adaptations, lifestyles and strategies, with God occasionally dabbling along the way. And please explain why if this is such a common hypothesis, you claimed that it was "entirely of your own making".-DAVID: Not my own making as I have explained. How about you tell me how the cells got so complicated to be the source of life, an emergent phenomenon. The ID folks have studied all of this and I agree with their consclusion.-You agree with their conclusion that cells were designed. But you seem to be out on your own with the hypothesis summarized above. I admire you for your individuality and your faith. As for your attempt to turn the tables on me, I do not profess to have an answer, but I have offered three equally unlikely possibilities: God, chance and panpsychist evolution. The "intelligent cell" hypothesis can be applied to all three, and remember I have suggested it in order to explain the process of evolution.
 
dhw: And do please tell us whether you think God preprogrammed the raft strategy in the very first living cells, or did a dabble to save the ants, Noah-like, from the flood?-DAVID: All I can do is observe and my natures wonders stream of observations on this website show how inventive life is. Is each one a God dabble? Or did God create life to be very inventive on its own? Your choice. Since you stand back as the non-believer What do you think? All Darwin-style evolution?-I love the stream of Nature's Wonders that you offer us, and they are an education in themselves. The above alternatives have left out your God's preprogramming the first cells with all those billions of innovations etc. "Each one a God dabble" = Creationism, which I find just as difficult to swallow. I am therefore inclined to believe that the vast variety of life produced by evolution can only have come through an inventive mechanism within the cells themselves (life itself doesn't invent) ... a mechanism permitting a huge range of combinations, very much dictated by the demands or opportunities presented by a randomly changing environment. This would certainly explain Darwin-style evolution, although the process is very different from what he envisaged ... mutations intelligently engineered from within the cells themselves, and not random. The origin of the "intelligent cell" - if the hypothesis is true - remains a mystery (see the three options above), but Darwin's theory also avoids speculation on the origin of life itself.