Brain complexity: circadian controls (Introduction)

by dhw, Sunday, October 04, 2015, 12:46 (3121 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: My post plus all the quotes was a response to your insistence that these molecules are machines and are not possessed of any kind of “intelligence”.DAVID: Of course there is 'intelligence'. You refuse to accept that these molecules have the ability to follow intelligent information which dictates their activity, intelligent information which is in the codes and modifying layers of the genome of each cell.-Computers also have the “ability to follow”, and the information is programmed into them. That is called artificial intelligence. They do not have natural intelligence of their own. The scientists I have referred to claim that cells are sentient, intelligent beings in their own right. Of course you are free to reject their findings, but please see my final comment below.-dhw: But “research into the biochemistry of bacteria” has gone beyond studying the biochemistry. That is the point that you refuse to recognize.
DAVID: I don't know what you are attempting to describe: " has gone beyond studying the biochemistry". I read the articles. All they can study is the biochemistry and then they create theories that suppose how that information creates life with a mental background. They and I both use 'mind', but they suppose it at a cellular level and I place it higher as God-given intelligent information. Your quotes illustrate exactly what I mean...-They also study behaviour, and just as you will deduce that your dog has intelligence of its own by the manner in which he responds to different situations, they deduce the same from their observation of these microorganisms. Incidentally, I don't know why you should consider automatism to be “higher” than natural intelligence, especially when you place humans at the top of the evolutionary pile because of their independent conscious minds.
 
DAVID: The scientists you quote, supplied to you by me, can be refuted by Michael Egnor and many others who are on my side of the 50/50 coin toss.-Refutation is not possible for either side - you have said yourself that we have no way of knowing which hypothesis is correct. But the difference between us on this subject lies in the appeal I made to you in my post last Friday: “I only ask that their findings should be taken seriously, as should the possible implications of those findings.” This whole website is devoted to discussing the nature of life, its possible sources, and all the implications of what little knowledge we have, and its immediate spur was my agnostic antipathy towards atheistic dogmatism. I have the same antipathy towards theistic dogmatism. If there is a 50/50 chance of a hypothesis being right, it seems to me that we should take it seriously, especially in view of its wide-ranging implications for evolution, for God (if he exists) and for his possible methods of working. That is not an appeal for belief, but the good old agnostic plea for open-mindedness!