More about how evolution works: look at the video (Evolution)

by dhw, Sunday, October 25, 2015, 12:21 (3315 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: I have great difficulty with the current all-pervasive concept of “information”. [...]
DAVID: Simple solution for you. You are struggling in the above quotes with descriptive information: the characteristics of ripples in water, energy and matter interchanges, new things happening all the time ( a flow of events). Descriptive information is the sort that describes the lattice of a crystal. But to achieve the specified complexity of living matter obviously requires a planning type of information which is provided by a complex code like DNA. Codes carry information, a point that cannot be avoided. Intellects make codes, crystals don't, even though crystals carry information of a static sort. Logical. -This was covered by the second of the quotes: “[information about] how inanimate matter can be transformed into living matter”, though perhaps I should have added self-reproducing and conscious to living. In the context of how evolution works, you often use the (to me) obfuscatory term “intelligent information” in your determination to substitute automatism for autonomous intelligence in cells, whereas “intelligence” will do just fine for us humans. However, that is not the subject of this discussion with BBella, which is about first cause energy: 
 
BBELLA: ...since all information that IS, is contained within ever transforming eternal energy, then it would seem to me that intelligence would be matter using information to intelligently create what IS. [...] It would seem to me that intelligence would need to have always been eternal just as energy and information has always been eternal [...]-BBella does not subscribe to your single God theory, and I am questioning what is this “eternal information”. I am sure she will explain, but it would be interesting to know what you think it means.-DAVID: The essay I presented yesterday by Lightman talks of the rarity of life in the universe. Obviously, special information was necessary to create it from the inorganic universe. Life is a separate microcosm universe within the universe, a very special segment of reality.-I had not intended to comment on the essay, but perhaps I should. It is beautifully written, but I got very little out of it beyond the fact that we are unique though we are not unique, the universe has meaning because we are here to give it meaning, and we are alive. Mercifully, he never once uses the word “information”, so I don't know why you bring it in here, although of course I agree that life is very special. One example of his beautiful writing and - to my mind - disconnected thinking will suffice:-LIGHTMAN: We cannot imagine a universe without meaning. We are not talking necessarily about some grand cosmic meaning, or a divine meaning bestowed by God, or even a lasting, eternal meaning. But just the simple, particular meaning of everyday events, fleeting events like the momentary play of light on a lake, or the birth of a child. [...]
And given our existence, our universe must have meaning, big and small meanings.-I would suggest that his examples denote the subjective importance we attach to elements of our life in this universe. As he says elsewhere, “If the minds don't exist, then neither does meaning”. So how does that lead to “our universe must have meaning”? Sorry if this sounds ungracious. And doubly sorry that it sheds no light whatsoever on the question of whether eternal energy is intelligent and what sort of “information” might be contained in eternal energy.