Rapid evolution or epigenetics? (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, March 04, 2011, 14:26 (5013 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: If the drive to complexity, to advance evolution, is part of the genome complex, and is coded in advance, then we can imagine that it is in direct drive, and must happen, but is coded in bush form, the pattern of the 'tree' we see,. The other way, your description, is under less control, relies more on itself, and is more likely to make mistakes, and automatically will be in bush form. However, we do not know if the evolution of the Earth, adding water, adding plasmatismals, adding atmosphere, having continental plate movement and subduction, etc. is under control or on its own. If on its own even a very guided evolution may make mistakes, not timing itself with geologic changes. Since I propose a UI, I think my proposal for the evolutionary mechanism is more likely. But either way, evolution gets to where we are.-This exchange is probably far more interesting and fruitful for someone who has not made up his mind than for someone who has, but I do hope you will stay with me. Your comment that "we do not know if the evolution of the Earth [...] is under control or on its own" is just as applicable to the evolution of life, and if my proposal (an intelligent mechanism within the germ cells that produces innovations) is less controlled and more self-reliant, that certainly doesn't make it either more or less likely. Even if you believe in a UI, the "likelihood" will depend on whether you think the UI did or did not start out with a plan. I'm surprised that you link direct drive to a bush form. As I have no sense of direction, that is frequently the pattern of our excursions, but by direct drive I would understand the shortest possible route. The bush seems to me to support the suggestion of no plan or ... as in my case ... bad plan, or plan gone wrong. -Still in the context of this discussion, I was struck by an unrelated but, in the wider context, extremely relevant comment in the article on consciousness: -"One of Damasio's favourite words is "image", which gets 34 entries in the book's index. Images are the basis of first-person being and hence, according to him, consciousness. Yet at the same time they are for the most part not experienced at all, and unconscious minds, such as those of insects, are seething with them."-I don't want to get side-tracked by attempting to define intelligence or consciousness (though we've had long discussions on this subject), but we do not actually know how intelligent/conscious other forms of life are. However, we do know that insects are capable of building astoundingly intricate structures and performing tasks that require detailed planning. Think of termite mounds. I do not believe that the first termites were shown how to do it by clever old Adam. No matter what evolutionary stages their mound-building went through, each one was decided by the termites themselves. Within our bodies are even more complex structures, and many of them function independently of our own conscious minds. If all life is descended from a few simple forms, then those structures (which contribute to what you call the 'drive to complexity') have resulted from innovations within organisms. We are an assembly of such structures and, as with insects, we do not know how intelligent is the internal mechanism that "invented" them. All three of our general options ... (1) pre-planning by a UI, (2) no planning by a UI, (3) no UI ... take evolution "to where we are". The question is the degree of chance involved. My suggestion increases it in relation to (1), and reduces it in relation to (2) and (3).