Cellular intelligence: (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, December 11, 2021, 13:24 (1076 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID (under “upright posture”): Giant fossil gaps are not explained by brilliant cell committees, a fantasy of your making, based upon observers opinion that cells act with such exact purpose, they must be intelligent, when it is clear to me from biochemical research they act with rigid automaticity and, therefore look intelligent, as all ID folks agree with me. You have your old 'experts', and I have my experts in present time. They are also highly trained Ph.D.'s like your were.

My experts in the field are not all old. I alerted you to several current websites, and you proceeded to misinterpret one or two quotes and then couldn’t be bothered to look at the rest. Giant fossil gaps are not explained by cellular intelligence but by the fact that we cannot expect fossils for every stage of every life form for the last 3.X thousand million years. However, the theory of cellular intelligence certainly solves the problems raised by the theory of random mutations, since intelligent design (by cells) would take far less time than sheer chance to come up with new methods of survival in ever changing conditions.

T cells:
DAVID: the key to the importance of these cells is that they develop at birth and quickly learn to recognize and neutralize foreign proteins. Obviously, continuing to live without dangerous infections is a requirement for life and this system is designed for just that protection. The cells arrive at birth with this built-in ability.

The article is too technical for me to follow, but my ears always prick up when I hear that cells learn, and arrive with a built-in ability to do so. Some of us would say that this is a hallmark of autonomous intelligence. If behaviour is already programmed and proceeds automatically, no ability is required because there is nothing to learn.

Baby immunity
DAVID: newborns arrive unprotected but with a robust system that is designed to be fiercely protective immediately. Automaticity is required by design.

Alternatively, newborns arrive with cells that have the ability to interpret, process, communicate with one another, and respond to new information. The baby does not control them. They control themselves. This ability – in the form of cellular intelligence – may have been designed by your God.

Pure automaticity
QUOTE: “In conclusion, TAF7 is a multifunctional regulator of gene expression, which coordinates many of the complex steps of gene expression."

DAVID: Controlling protein must be precise to produce the right products. There is no other interpretation but that these processes are totally automatic under very tight controls, by design. No cellular decisions required.

You keep playing the same game, which is to present the complex actions of cells which HAVE to behave automatically if an existing system is to survive. This applies to virtually all our bodily functions. And I keep pointing out that intelligence is only required and applied in two contexts: 1) the origin of the system, and 2) when conditions change. I think the two contexts are linked. Intelligence (you try to disguise it as “the ability to interpret”) comes into play when there are internal problems (the system itself breaks down) or external problems (changing environments, foreign invaders). In all such cases, the automatic repetition of behaviour is disrupted, and cells must...here we go again...perceive new information, process it, communicate with one another, and take decisions as to how to cope with it (forms of "repair" or adaptation) or – going one step further – exploit it. The latter would result in what Shapiro calls “evolutionary novelty”. Not proven, of course, any more than your theory of divinely programmed “algorithms” is proven, along with its astonishing combination of “the ability to interpret” and a full list of instructions which require no such ability because the recipients are mindlessa automatons.