Natures wonders: Crocodile tools (Introduction)

by David Turell @, Wednesday, December 11, 2013, 02:21 (3751 days ago) @ dhw


> dhw: You juggle with two types of information: information in the genetic code, and information we absorb and process from our contact with the outside world. Whenever I want to discuss the mechanism (intelligence) which deals with the latter, you switch to the former and ask for its source. -That is because I want you to clearly make the distinction. I know there are both kinds of information as you do, but I am insisting that in the simple organisms, what looks like intelligence is really programs running on information in the genome, and those programs respond to information the sensory mechanism pick up.-
> dhw; Once again, it is the non-instinctive element that I am focusing on. We agree that human intelligence is vastly more developed than that of other organisms, but that does not mean other organisms are not intelligent. -At the advanced level like corvids, dogs, apes, yes they have some simple intelligence.-
> 
> dhw: Of course you have every right to dismiss the research of those specialists who believe bacteria to be intelligent. Any concessions for my friends the ant-teachers?-I agree they instruct, but perhaps by instinct only.


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