New Miscellany Parts 1 &:2: evolution, intelligence, eco (General)

by dhw, Tuesday, May 06, 2025, 11:16 (3 days ago) @ David Turell

Evolution

DAVID: Shapiro's theory is a mighty stretch of bacterial abilities.

dhw: Since intelligence and life itself began with single cells, of course subsequent forms of life and of intelligence become a “mighty stretch”. The process is called evolution. You have not explained how your God could organize dog-eat-dog without giving every dog its own intelligence. Your alternative would have to be that he plays games with himself, not only instructing them how to kill and how to avoid being killed (strategies) but also providing them with their various weapons (physical attributes). Dog-eat-dog becomes god-eat-god!

DAVID: Your fantasies are now hallucinations. All dogs can think as can all prey animals

As can all other animals, birds, insects, fish. And even single-cell bacteria, which have no brains, can think. That's how they all survive. It is YOUR fantasy/hallucination that your God has to teach possums to play dead, weaverbirds to build their nests…in fact to give instructions to all cells (including our own immune cells) to become the enemy or to resist the enemy, as well as to change their structures in order to meet or exploit new conditions. Indeed, so fantastic is your belief that you attribute the eventual FAILURE of 99.9% to make those changes, not to limited cellular intelligence but to your God’s own incompetence, because despite his omnipotence and omniscience, he has designed and had to cull them as they were not what he wanted to design! None of this excludes the theory of a God that designed cellular intelligence. But you refuse to recognize that dog-eat-dog = a free-for-all which DEMANDS the autonomous intelligence at both strategic and physical levels, which you keep rejecting.

Mind and cosmos

QUOTE: “Eventually, I came to believe that intelligence is not a byproduct of the brain, but a fundamental property of the universe—a kind of informational ether that certain structures, like the brain or an AI model, can tap into.'” (dhw’s bold)

dhw: […] I have asked if you understand this concept, but I can only assume that you find it as incomprehensible as I do.

DAVID: It makes some sense if you wish to dip into Panentheism and imagine the universe as an invention in God's mind.

dhw: I don’t understand that either. Do you really believe that the material world doesn’t exist? Of course you don’t. The universe may have been your God’s material invention, but how does that come to mean that when an atheist thinks to himself that there is no God, his brain is actually “tapping into” God’s mind?

DAVID: Why not? But don't tell the atheist.

So when you and I disagree about your God’s existence, nature, purpose, method, you think he is arguing with himself and passing his thoughts onto us. We are merely “tapping into his mind”.

Theoretical origin of life

DAVID: There are no contradictions in the view I take: God wanted to create us and protect us with a great food supply.

dhw: And so according to you, that is why he designed and had to cull 99.9 out of 100 species and econiches that had no connection with us and our food, and you can’t think of any reason other than his messy, cumbersome inefficiency. Wouldn’t you say this contradicts the notion of your God as being omnipotent and omniscient?

DAVID: For the umpteenth time, God evolved us in a cumbersome way, but that was His choice. It was quite effective. We are here running the world.

We could also still be here running the world if he had WANTED the species you say he designed and culled: for example through a free-for-all (perhaps with occasional interventions), experiments to discover the potential of his invention etc. Why MUST he be a messy, cumbersome, inefficient designer, when history allows an interpretation that has him designing precisely what he wants to design? Ah, but you “first choose a God I wish to believe in. The rest follows.”” Why do you wish to believe in an inefficient designer?

Whale’s contribution to nutrition

dhw: How ironic, that the most intelligent beings on the planet should be using their expertise to destroy the planet and themselves!

DAVID: At least no more whaling!

dhw: Good point, except that some countries – e.g. Japan – are still killing them. But you can hardly blame them when you realize that the USA continues to expand its already huge fossil fuel industries, which will have vastly more impact on our “ability to balance the global carbon budget”.

DAVID: Just accept your Petrol will cost less.

Even that is doubtful, but why should I just “accept” the fact that thousands more people will die because fossil fuels are toxic? And just to anticipate your response: no, I’m not arguing for immediate banning of fossil fuels. That would be impractical and indeed ruinous in the modern world. I’m arguing for a practical phasing out, geared to intensified research on alternatives. Destroying the world’s economic and social systems would be just as ruinous as continuing the practices that are currently destroying the environment.