Cellular intelligence: Animal Algorithms reviewed (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, November 15, 2021, 12:07 (1102 days ago) @ David Turell

Control of differentiation
DAVID: The appearance of conscious intelligence can be the result of intelligent design.

dhw: I keep agreeing that cellular intelligence may have been designed by your God. The argument is over its existence, not its possible source.

DAVID: Agreed, as below:

DAVID: from the outside of cells we can see the intelligent activity but not its cause. I'm still point to either/or 50/50.

dhw: What are you pointing to now? Its existence being 50/50 (then don’t dismiss it), or your God being its cause (I’ll settle for 50/50 on that)?

DAVID: Possibility is 50/50 and pick your side if you wish. I have my side.

I'll settle for that!

Animal algorithms
DAVID: You completely miss the point of the neural complexity that this AI expert denies that natural evolution could have designed it.

dhw: No he doesn’t. He asks if animals have minds, and says the question is unanswered!
I shan’t repeat the quotes, as you only have one point to make:

DAVID: Cells are distinctively different than our minds. I view God as creating entire cellular processes.

dhw: If cells have minds, then of course they are different from ours. That is why the writer put the word in inverted commas. But no matter how different a mind may be, its attribute of conscious intelligence (the ability to think) has to be present. You think the chances are 50/50, which for you means 100% no.

DAVID: If there are two possibilities, I am allowed to pick one side as more logical based on my knowledge of living biochemistry.

Yes of course, and Shapiro, McClintock, Margulis, Bühler and others are allowed to pick their side, based on their knowledge of living biochemistry.

dhw: Even if Mr Bartlett is like you, and can’t imagine animals and cells having “minds”, what he has written does not in any way weaken the case for cellular intelligence.

DAVID: The 'case' is pure opinion as we all are outside the action.

dhw: You accused me of distorting the meaning of the above quotes. I have shown you that they can be used to support the case for cellular intelligence. That is a matter of text interpretation, not of our different opinions on the subject.

DAVID: You will always support cellular innate intelligence as your rigid theory.

It's not rigid, but see below for my view of it.

dhw: And you have offered us quotes which support the possibility of cellular intelligence (we don’t know if they have minds), whereas you think the text is saying they do not have minds.

DAVID: Coming from an ID source what else should I think. You distort textual meanings to fit your rigid wish for innate cellular intelligence, although when pressed you allow God to give it to cells to use without God's guidance. It that an agnostic balancing act of a fair neutral view of God. I think it is unbalanced.

You should examine the quote and recognize that it fits in perfectly well with your God giving cells the ability to think. I have not been “pressed” into “allowing” God anything. I am an agnostic, and if the theory of cellular intelligence is true, I acknowledge a 50/50 chance of your God being its designer. What is unbalanced? I also acknowledge that the theory is not proven, and the mystery of life and evolution remains unsolved, but in all honesty I must confess that I find the theory more convincing than the idea of your God preprogramming the whole history of life 3.8 billion years ago, or of him popping in to turn legs into flippers, or to give courses to weaverbirds in nest-building.