Introducing the brain: where the spiritual happens (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, June 05, 2018, 12:36 (2361 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: You are describing an 'emergent' consciousness, which means the immaterial somehow appears from the material. That's the HARD PROBLEM no one can solve.

dhw: That is exactly what the materialistic part of my proposal describes, but I am not pretending it solves the “HARD PROBLEM”. I offer it as a reconciliation between materialism and dualism.

DAVID: I don't think it works.

It might be helpful if you would tell me WHY you think it doesn’t work.

DAVID: What 'other consciousnesses' are you referring to in linking? I'm not linked to yours. I can only assume you have one.

dhw: The whole of evolution involves the linking up of cell communities, and if these cell communities are intelligent and together create new organs and organisms, they link their conscious intelligences together. My hypothesis does not exclude Sheldrake’s morphic resonance, in which a kind of generic consciousness emerges from that of individuals, and it does not exclude the possibility that there is a universal consciousness (which you call God) to which ours may be linked.

DAVID: If the cells are intelligent is just as possible that they were designed to contain intelligent information.

What does “intelligent information” mean? It sounds impressively scientific, but as an explanation for evolution, what you offer us is computer programmes designed by your God 3.8 billion years ago, to be passed down for billions of organisms to switch on at certain times in order to create every evolutionary innovation, lifestyle and natural wonder in the history of life. That doesn’t sound quite so impressively scientific to me.

Under “broken feathers”:
DAVID: Why ask for cell cooperation than simply doing it yourself, which is probably God's view since He is in charge.

dhw: Cell cooperation is essential to all forms of life. If you think billions of computer programmes and personal interventions for each form of cooperation are simpler than a single invention, then so be it.

DAVID: Of course cell communities are designed to work together as they evolve.

So how does that make billions of computer programmes and personal interventions simpler than the single invention I call cellular intelligence?