Consciousness; a radically new theory. Romansh? (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, June 30, 2015, 12:43 (3433 days ago) @ David Turell

I am combining the posts on consciousness and ID, since they now overlap.-dhw:... but I am not prepared to reject the possibility that some form of intelligence may have evolved in certain materials, which enabled them to combine and create the first forms of life. This hypothesis suggests that mentation/quasi-consciousness/non-human intelligence or whatever you like to call it BEGAN with “things” - a hypothesis I find no more and no less convincing than those of a causeless universal consciousness that simply IS, or chance randomly putting the elements of life together, neither of which is substantiated by any evidence other than the speculative interpretations of their supporters.-DAVID: The mental state evolved in living matter. Prior to life there was no 'mentation' Since it involves having life, 'things' other than life do not have mentation. And life was around a long tome before nerve cells appeared. I know you want sentience without nerve cells, but here you and I strongly differ.-It is not just you and I who differ. When one expert after expert another claims that bacteria are sentient, cognitive beings, as a layman I am in no position to reject their findings out of hand as you do. I would expect at least a degree of open-mindedness. As far as living matter is concerned, most of us would agree that a rook is alive and a rock is not, but there does not seem to be any consensus on the precise borderline between life and non-life. I suggest that similarly no-one can be sure where the borderline lies between mentation and non-mentation. 
 
DAVID: I think your theory lacks a beginning phase and therefore rings hollow to me.-All theories ring hollow (see below). Your own has no beginning either: supreme consciousness has apparently always been there.
 
dhw: Secondly, the three hypotheses (your God, chance, and the evolution of “mentation”) are ALTERNATIVES, which I neither accept nor reject. That is to say, I cannot decide which (if any) of them is true, and so I withhold judgement on all of them. After so many years, dear David, you still haven't understood what I mean by agnosticism!
DAVID: I fully understand your brand of agnosticism. It admits to all sorts of possible theories with a shut mind against all.-I have come up with just three possible theories, as above, which I neither accept nor reject. That means I am aware of their flaws, but have an open mind towards them. This is in stark contrast to your blanket dismissal of any theory other than that of a designer God, and your absolute rejection of bacterial intelligence and of the possibility of an autonomous inventive mechanism, even if designed by your God. And yet you admit that your theory is so flawed that it requires a leap of faith for you to believe it.