Explaining natural wonders (Animals)

by dhw, Friday, April 28, 2017, 17:41 (2765 days ago) @ David Turell

Once again, I’ll condense the posts for the sake of clarity.

Dhw: If you really can’t tell me what you mean by guidelines, you should not be surprised that I have a problem with them.
DAVID: 'Guidelines' obviously means there are instructions in the genome we haven't found, or God offers directions directly (by dabbling).
dhw: So “guidelines” turn out to be the same as preprogramming or direct instructions. That makes the weaverbird, the wasp, the spider, the cuttlefish, the monarch butterfly etc. into automatons, with no inventive intelligence of their own.
DAVID: I've shown today there are limited brain functions, if brains are present.

If brains are present, they will presumably function, and even our own brains are limited. That does not mean that God preprogrammed or dabbled every natural wonder in the history of life. (See below, re the sentience and cognitive powers of insects.)

dhw: So your God designed the urchin’s spikes and all the other natural wonders because his only purpose was to design humans. As I said before, your God – who let us remember is now without limitations – moves in mysterious ways. See above for a less mysterious hypothesis.
DAVID: You are again avoiding the issue of supplying energy so evolution can proceed.

You are again avoiding the issue that all life needs energy, and that has nothing whatsoever to do with your theory that all life forms were designed by God, whose one and only purpose was to design humans.

Dhw: … Yes, limited intelligence, but intelligence all the same, without the need for your God to preprogramme or dabble or “imprint” anything except, perhaps, intelligence itself.
DAVID: You are still blindly limited to the complexity you want these limited brains to provide. Those brains do learn and respond as I've shown today, but in a limited way:

I have acknowledged that their intelligence is limited. (So is ours.) If a bird builds a complicated nest, that does not mean it can invent a computer or a rocket to the moon or a theory concerning the existence of God. It can build a nest and solve problems relating to its own existence. Not proven, but for me far from impossible.

QUOTE: (under “insects”): “We often think of insects as tiny automata—robots with everything built-in and programmed. But it is increasingly evident that insects can remember, learn, think, and communicate in quite rich and unexpected ways. Much of this, doubtless, is built-in—but much, too, seems to depend on individual experience.” It’s precisely that unexpected angle that we need to keep our eye on. While it’s far less easy to offer a definitive statement about sentience in insects than about intelligence or personality, insects are surprising us."
DAVID’s comment: I believe Sacks is correct. It takes a brain to experience stimuli and learn to respond. I've skipped some examples in the essay.

Insects can solve problems, which is probably the best guide to “intelligence”. I am not in the least surprised by these discoveries, and in due course more and more scientists will probably join McClintock, Margulis, Shapiro and others in concluding that even brainless bacteria are sentient, cognitive, intelligent beings. Many thanks for continuing to provide so much evidence for what you do not believe in.