Cell Memories (Identity)

by dhw, Saturday, July 26, 2014, 22:07 (3772 days ago) @ David Turell
edited by dhw, Saturday, July 26, 2014, 22:26

dhw: How automatic is “rather” automatically? And if it comes to that, what do you mean by information “running” biology?-DAVID: Same argument. I've covered this in the previous post. -It is not the same. “Rather” automatically is an important modification, because it is precisely the non-automatic element of the decision-making that denotes autonomous intelligence. My point was that some people argue that humans are “run” by their biology and therefore do not have free will. You oppose this view because you believe there is a mental, decision-making capacity that transcends biology. This is an ability which you insist only applies to humans and their fellow animals, but not to other organisms, which you regard as automata (see also under “Junk DNA”).-dhw: So are you arguing that every manifestation of intelligence by humans and our fellow animals is the result of “information in the genome running the show”? Of course you aren't .....in our discussion on fruit flies you say it's the ability to adapt and not the “life plan” that has been preprogrammed. That to me is tantamount to saying that your God has given cells and cell communities the intelligence to work out their own life plan. Once again, then, they are not automata. Either the life plan has been preprogrammed or the cell community works it out. You can't have it both ways.-DAVID: I'm not having it both ways. But it is what you are advocating. You must understand the different levels at which the cellular intelligence operates. The cell senses chemically what is required and refers to the genome to find an answer.-Why do you separate the genome from the cell/cell community? Most of us assume that human intelligence is linked to the brain, but we don't say humans are not intelligent - they only sense chemically what is required and refer to the brain to find an answer. If cellular intelligence lies within the genome, that's fine with me. (Albrecht-Buehler thinks the control centre is the centrosome.) All I ask is acknowledgement that although much cellular behaviour is undoubtedly automatic once an innovation has established itself - as is clear from the work of our own cellular communities - Margulis, Shapiro, Albrecht-Buehler & Co. may be right when they say cells are intelligent, sentient beings. This provides us with a vital clue as to how evolutionary adaptation and innovation may have taken place.