Let's study ID: giraffe plumbing: cognition (Introduction)

by dhw, Sunday, October 31, 2021, 12:30 (1120 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: But since you have no idea how to explain your theory (you tell me to go and ask God), we are doomed to your endless dodging.

DAVID: The use of the word 'dodge' is meaningless. We have an insoluble disagreement.

dhw: If I ask why your God would have designed countless forms of life and food that had no connection with humans, although you say his only goal was humans plus food, and you tell me to go and ask God, I count that as dodging. I shan’t go through the long list of other dodges.

DAVID: Not a dodge, but making the point God didn't tell me but might answer you.

You claim that your theory is logical, and you admit that you can’t find a logical explanation. Thank you for confirming the latter. So please stop claiming the former.

Immunity system complexity
QUOTE: “Everywhere we look, there are ubiquitous conversations among all cells in all organisms. [..]

DAVID: I agree with the quote. Nowhere does He say cells are in and of themselves intelligent.

dhw: Then why is his blog called “cellular intelligence”? How can organisms converse and exchange information if they don’t have the intelligence to communicate with and understand each other?

DAVID: All opinion!

dhw: Yes, his opinion is that cells are intelligent.

QUOTE: "…..reveal a level of cellular intelligence that is unrecognised by science and is not amenable to computer analysis."

DAVID: Just my point. We scientists do not recognize it.

dhw: Your point was that Shapiro was McClintock’s only current “follower”. The theory is not recognized as a fact, but this author SUPPORTS it! You “didn’t waste time digging into the others”, which apparently proves that none of these scientists advocates the theory. Try this one:

QUOTE: "Perception, memory, valence, learning, decision-making, anticipation, communication – all once thought the preserve of humankind – are found in a wide variety of living things, including bacteria, unicellular eukaryotes, plants, fungi, non-neuronal animals, and animals with simple nervous systems and brains.”
Read the Wikipedia list of references. And yet you claim McClintock has had only one follower!

DAVID: My point remains, it is all opinion, no proof, and claimed "unrecognized by science" (above).

That was not your point. Stop dodging! First you claimed that McClintock had no current followers except Shapiro, and then you claimed that a raft of articles which explicitly support cellular intelligence do NOT support cellular intelligence. We don’t need to be told that there is no proven theory. If there was, there would be nothing to discuss.

Common design
dhw: […] please tell us whether you think humans are descended from bacteria or from the Cambrian life forms you think your God created without precursors. And if he created a new line for us, why did he bother to create all the other lines that had no connection with us?

DAVID: We all come from the earliest Archaean forms, i.e., the start of life's processes. Latter forms all use the same basic processes. The Cambrian gap is a phenotypical gap, not a biochemical gap. […]

And under “Miscellany” you wrote: “Our human biochemistry comes directly from bacteria. When Darwin lamented about the Cambrian gap he could only view evolution by changing forms. I see God the designer creating the forms based upon the underlying processes creating life.”

Of course every life form is based on biochemical processes, but you can only view evolution by the changing forms, and it is these that result in speciation. You say your God only wanted to design our species plus food, and yet for reasons unknown he also individually designed all the other life forms, most of which had no connection with us. And he also designed new forms without precursors, from which we (plus lots of other non-human forms) are descended, but we are descended from bacteria. But you can't see the contradictions.

DAVD: It is interesting that you are trying a twisted subterfuge about the Cambrian gap as a gross contradiction. It acts as proof of as designer, remember, since the Edicaran precursors are so simple in form as compared to the Cambrian animals.

Even the simplest forms are so complex that you can cite them as evidence for a designer. That is a totally different issue. There is no subterfuge. So once more, please explain why you emphasize our descent from life forms with no precursors if you think that biochemical processes are the only factor to be considered in explaining the history of evolution.

DAVID: I view all responses to all changes as automatic, but agree not absolutely proven as yet.

I know your views. Your “not absolutely proven as yet” is on the same level of blinkered faith as Dawkins’ hope: “If there is something that appears to lie beyond the natural world as it is now imperfectly understood, we hope eventually to understand it and to embrace it within the natural.” And the two of you call yourselves scientists.