Free Will, and consciousness: Egnor's latest (Introduction)

by David Turell , Saturday, December 12, 2020, 00:33 (1225 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Does an 'intelligent cell' have a mind? Certainly not, but it can contain intelligent instructions from a mind providing the appearance of teleology in living actions.. Only a mind can consider future needs and design for them. This consideration solves Gould's famous and well-recognized problem with fossil gaps.

dhw: Why “certainly not”? Even you have admitted that the odds are 50/50. But not a mind like ours. Reread Shapiro’s quote on the other thread. And please stop pretending that evolution involves gazing into a crystal ball. The theory I have proposed involves REACTING to conditions, not forecasting them. The problem of fossil gaps would be solved if there were a continuous fossil record of every creature that ever lived.

DAVID: The crystal ball is required for animals to jump into aquatic life. They are my strongest argument for design being required.

dhw: I would suggest this is your weakest argument – complexity being your strongest. If an animal sees that there is more food in the water than there is on the land, and it has a better chance of surviving in the water, then it will enter the water. The necessary adaptations will then follow.

The problem unsolved is how does that happen. I'll stick with God designing.

xxxxxx

Memory Formation

DAVID: This is a look at the cellular genetic and molecular level of encoding memories. Note the memory is an abstraction of an event. The brain has recorded it but none of this research explains how consciousness can seek and find it in recall. The soul to brain link is there but never seen. In my view of dualism discussions and debates, this fact must be emphasized: invisibly tied together.

dhw: Yes, the authors do the same as you often do when discussing cellular intelligence: you and they focus on the material processes and ignore the intelligence that directs those processes. Your point here is covered by the discussion above and by the first post on Egnor’s theories.

DAVID: The 'intelligence' is simply implanted intelligent instructions that run the cells.

dhw: Your usual statement of opinion as if it were fact.

Your view isn't fact either. We still look at the cells from the outside