Natures wonder: cuttle fish survival mechanism (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, December 08, 2015, 20:51 (3055 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: I am interested in your ideas on telepathy. As a dualist, you believe that the mind is separate from the body, and souls communicate by telepathy and without a brain. This means you believe in the possibility of thought existing independently of the brain. So that gets rid of the argument that organisms without a brain cannot think.-DAVID: I know that species consciousness exists at the human level from Sheldrake's work, and with Blue Tits and other species and information can be passed by that mechanism. -I'm not sure if you're doing a wriggle here, switching from thought and consciousness to passing information. But if blue tits and other species can think and pass thoughts (= telepathy) independently of the brain as well as by sounds, chemicals, movements etc., who knows - Billie Bacterium may also have the gift.-dhw: Organisms without a brain may have the equivalent of a brain. But I am just pointing out that what is good for Davids, doggies, corvids and cuttles may also be good for busy bacteria.-DAVID: I haven't ever seen an object that is the equivalent of a brain. Wish away. Brains support the reception of consciousness. You think bacteria are conscious?-Albrecht-Buehler says the control centre of the cell (or brain equivalent) is the centrosome, and “microtubules mediate between the control centre and the autonomous domains”. Whatever you may think, it's clear that those scientists who advocate cellular/bacterial intelligence believe there is some sort of brain equivalent, and I am leaning more and more towards their viewpoint - bearing in mind that intelligence at this level will entail awareness of the environment and of one another, the ability to take decisions etc., but not the human, philosophizing self-awareness you sometimes conflate with the word “consciousness”.