More Denton: A new book (Introduction)

by dhw, Thursday, March 03, 2016, 13:05 (3187 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: And you still miss my point, which is that an autonomous organism by definition does not “use” anyone's wishes except its own and is not guided. Your self-navigating car was invented by humans so that it could navigate “without human input”, and my inventive mechanism was (or rather, may have been) invented by God so that it could invent without God's input. If you really want an analogy, it is one that I have already given you before. You believe humans have free will. That means, in theistic terms, your God gave humans the ability and the mechanism with which to make their own decisions, independently of his wishes and without any “guidance software on board”. - DAVID: But God also gave humans consciousness which means they can plan for any complex advances they wish. - In my hypothesis, as you well know, cells have consciousness, which they may have been given by your God (see below). Advance planning is not part of my concept. My IM begins with an opportunity offered by the environment and responds by developing the innovation (much as an artist, writer, composer may begin with an idea and then develop it). According to you, this happens because something (probably also the environment) triggers your God's 3.8-billion year computer programme for the dorsal nervous system, the dragonfly's migration (another wonderful post, thank you), and the weaverbird's nest. According to me, the cooperating cell communities of which the organisms are composed work it out for themselves. In both cases, if it didn't happen relatively quickly, it wouldn't survive (though of course modifications may follow later). See also the very enlightening post on amoeba for how cooperation creates complexity. 
 
dhw: Do you believe God programmed Beethoven to write his symphonies? If you don't, then the analogy can be applied to all organisms: your God gave them the ability and the mechanism with which to make their own decisions. That is autonomy. You may not believe organisms have such a mechanism, but please do not define autonomous as being guided by God to obey what you believe to be his wishes. - DAVID: Your definition of autonomy assumes the IM can plan for complex advances in evolution. There is our difference in interpretation. Evolutionary advances require intricate planning. How does your IM do that without consciousness? Thus my auto analogy fits my concept of an autonomous IM which must have onboard instructions or be given consciousness. - As regards “intricate planning”, see above. The IM is within the cell/cell community, and of course my hypothesis depends entirely on cells being conscious! (But cellular consciousness is not the same as human self-awareness.) That is why I keep repeating the unequivocal declaration by different experts in the field that cells are sentient, intelligent, cognitive, decision-making beings. The fact that you dismiss the very possibility of cells being conscious does not invalidate the findings of these experts or the hypothesis that I have based on those findings. Once more: my autonomous IM is conscious, and if it wasn't, it could not be autonomous.