Biological complexity: how the cell proteasome works (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, May 05, 2017, 12:40 (2760 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: All we can say is that the first living cells were produced by an unknown force. We have no idea what that force is or was, how it originated, whether it is singular or plural, absent or present, working from top to bottom or bottom to top...
DAVID: What we can say is design is required. the complexity demands that.

But we have no idea what did the designing. Hence the “unknown force”.

dhw: But in the light of some of your current posts (for which once more many thanks), I will point out the evidence for bottom-up evolution, the point being that rudimentary intelligence can create ever more sophisticated forms of intelligence by combining with other intelligences. This is summed up by the Wikipedia article I referred to earlier:
“Microbial intelligence (popularly known as bacterial intelligence) is the intelligence shown by microorganisms. The concept encompasses complex adaptive behaviour shown by single cells, and altruistic or cooperative behavior in populations of like or unlike cells mediated by chemical signalling that induces physiological or behavioral changes in cells and influences colony structures.”
(Please note that chemical signalling is their form of communication, and does not denote automaticity.)
DAVID: I will simply repeat that my interpretation and that of the ID scientists is that the cells are totally automatic and contain intelligently implanted information.

There is no need to repeat your interpretation. I made it clear that I am explaining how evolution can proceed from bottom up (intelligent microorganisms combining their intelligences to create ever greater complexity) as opposed to top down (your “God” planning everything). You may not believe this hypothesis, but that does not invalidate the logic, and there is no more proof that your God preprogrammes/dabbles (or indeed exists) than there is that microorganisms are intelligent enough to do their own innovating.

dhw: This is not to minimize the problem of the very first cells, but I am simply trying to show that intelligent design does not necessarily mean a single mind that knows and plans everything (top down); intelligent design can be the product of intelligent communities that learn from experience and (bottom up) create ever more complex designs as they build on the work of their predecessors. (My bold)
DAVID: Intelligence had to appear in the first cells.

Of course it did, and in my hypothesis I allow for your “God” having implanted the intelligence that drives it. (But see below and under “Information”.)

DAVID: Intelligence is immaterial and requires thoughtful planning to be useful in having evolution progress from simple single celled to complex multicellular, granting that the initial cells are highly complex to begin with. I simply accept that God supplied the intelligence from the beginning.

“Accept” is the wrong word. That is what you believe, but you have ignored everything else I have said in my post about the term “God”. Whatever supplied the intelligence from the beginning is an unknown force.