David's theory of evolution: Stephen Talbott's view; agency (Evolution)

by David Turell , Monday, November 16, 2020, 15:17 (1466 days ago) @ dhw

QUOTE: Single cells don’t have minds of their own – so surely they don’t have goals, determination, gusto? When we attribute aims and purposes to these primitive organisms, aren’t we just succumbing to an illusion?

dhw: All the subsequent intellectual faffing around would be totally unnecessary if only Talbott would take the bull by the horns and acknowledge that single cells have their own form of intelligence (not to be compared to that of the human mind), and we do not know its source.

DAVID: How about God as the agency? This author just mimicked Talbott.

dhw: Why do you have to have your God sitting inside every single cell, providing it with its aims, determination and gusto, and making every decision in every situation it faces? How about your God designing both the cell and the mechanism that enables it to make its own decisions? I don’t understand your second comment.

DAVID: You've got it!!! God is not in every cell but His instructions as information in the genome provide all the cells need to respond to stimuli and demands automatically. My comment is obvious if you remember Talbott's writings. The author and Talbott are looking for the ghost in the machine that makes cells respond intelligently.

dhw: Ah, sorry. I had missed the fact that Talbott was not the author! Yes, Gilbert Ryle’s “ghost in the machine” is the nub of the matter. I’m afraid I still find it impossible to believe that your God placed instructions in the first cells for every single innovation and every single solution to every problem for the rest of time. Even you find that hard to believe, since you also allow him to dabble. We should remember that millions of cell communities fail to respond adequately to stimuli and demands, which already raises question marks over the efficacy of your God’s “instructions”. How much simpler it would be if the ghost in all the different machines was a form of intelligence which responds in different ways to stimuli and demands – those ways varying from failure to adaptation to innovation. THAT would explain the whole of evolution, and it still leaves a place for God as the inventor of both the ghost and the machine.

Same old issue. Obviously intelligent information/instructions is at work, and the source is?
Chance is laughable.