I meant 'the topic of your question' ...



...which does not line up with any one field. But I would certainly recommend studying biology as a whole, and evolution specifically. You seem to be sincerely interested in learning about this, and while there is much to be said for discussing it in these forums, there would be much to gain from reading the texts used in the formal study of biology and evolution.



Its not often that I hear "nature did it", and if someone is going to be so flippant as that, I wouldn't presume to know what they mean, either.



I don't think that you can. I think you have to have knowledge of the designer to presume that something is designed.



Oh, yes, I did NOT mean to suggest 'go read a book instead of this thread'! I meant: for that one question, reading, say, biology texts has a lot to offer.

Well I doubt that any single enzyme can duplicate itself from raw elements - but many enzymes will assemble copies of themselves from certain raw materials.

As far as intelligence - oh, semantics! - for this conversation, I'll say yes: the enzyme has no intelligence, it encodes information, and it duplicates itself. To me, this is a significant stepping stone between matter with no special information being encoded in it, all the way up to intelligence.



Depending on your point of view, one driving force is the same one for all chemical reactions - thermodynamics. The forward reaction is thermodynamically favorable.

As far as the difference between the enzyme and the rock - thats where I think a thorough understanding requires reading some good books. A rock is not structured to replicate itself, but an enzyme is.


Actually, you could probably argue that some 'rocks' are structured to replicate themselves in certain circumstances - I'm given to believe that sand, when blow against a rock mountain, breaks that mountain down and yields more sand. But thats steps away from the key fact here - the replicated enzymes encode the same information. That is a huge difference between sand helping to make more sand - the enzyme causes very specific information to be replicated.

I agree that 'design' is tied to 'intent', but I'm not sure about the dichotomy you create here. I want to add " ... or as a result of complex, rule based interactions."

If I place a ball at the top of a hill, it will roll to the bottom along a path. Is that happenstance? Is the path happenstance?

This is a semantic issue, but "accident", "randomity", and "happenstance" all have the feeling of 'arbitrary-ness' as well as complete non-predictability.

I don't have the time or inclination to bury myself in a bunch of books about biology and evolution and I believe that even if I did, the answer I am looking for IS NOT THERE.

It is my feeling that the answer can be stated simply.

How would one actually measure intelligence? Isn't even THAT relative? Wouldn't you say that an enzyme is more intelligent than a rock because it replicates itself?

Given that thermodynamics is all about energy and energy exchanges I think that the term is more of a description of what is happening during energy exchanges.

Everything in the universe is an exchange of energy AND information. ("encoding")

It seems to me that if there is NO INTELLIGENCE involved in the constant energy and information exchanges then what good is the energy or information? There is no point to it. Information is for mind. It is supposed to be used for something. The energy is for life and movement.

It seems to me that the intention is life. It seems to me that life is the design.

The answer you are looking for? Do you mean the true answer to the question you are looking to have answered? Or do you mean the answer that you prefer?



Oh, no, the 'intelligence' semantic issue I tried to avoid. Generally, yes, intelligence is relative. Personally, I lean against saying enzymes are intelligent. But I guess you could say that enzymes are 'closer' to intelligence than, say, the rock I saw earlier on the sidewalk.



You mean, as opposed to providing an answer to the question "whats the driving force" ? I suppose it depends on how far back you look. It would seem that thermodynamics does provide the immediate driving force. So whats the driving force behind having laws of thermodynamics such as they are? That might be on the other side of the veil. (Not the same veil Abra keeps mentioning - but the one that we'd have to pierce to understand exactly how the universe came to be.




So are you equating intrinsic value to 'having a point' ? Many people do. Others simply appreciate that things are, without needing there to be a point or a purpose for it to have value.



Thats sounds like a personal belief, which I respect. Once you have this belief, however, and are committed to it, it will shape how you see, understand, interpret, so many other things. In other words, I'm not sure one can aspire to a relatively unbiased view of the design question, as long as one has this belief. (Aspire being a key word, since we all have some bias.)



At the moment, it appears that other questions, which I thought you meant as questions, were actually rhetorical.

The answers that you think (or believe) that reading all those books provide will not be the answer to my question. They might be enough for some people, but they are not enough for me. They are merely descriptions of the process.

Logically, every living thing that reproduces itself has a very small amount of intelligence and information. Not enough to do much of course. It is necessary for intelligence and information to exist in the smallest thing for it to be able to grow into a more useful or intelligent thing.

Otherwise, you will have to declare a point where you have to say "and then a miracle happened!" ...and suddenly there was intelligence.

This is not the way it happened, nor is it logical.

Scientists don't acknowledge intelligence until it becomes apparent TO THEM. They are not being logical. Intelligence did not just suddenly happen as a miracle.







Okay, then you agree that intelligence is relative, and that an enzyme is "more intelligent" than a rock. Then would you agree that all small things have a degree of intelligence? If not, then at what magical point did they acquire intelligence?



There again, you speak of appearances, overlooking the logic. Because it is the first and only thing you can actually "see" you conclude that this thing must be the "driving force?" Isn't that an assumption? What do you know that would support this assumption?



The other side of the veil has to be explored through logic alone since you can't see it. Yet you (and scientists) seem to ignore the logic.




Because I look for reason and purpose or "a point" does NOT MEAN THAT I do not appreciate "what is" and its value. I do. Are you suggesting that I should not look for purpose or a point when seeking the truth of being? Energy and information has a purpose and a use. Don't you agree?



Everything is a personal belief and thank you for respecting mine.

But I will ask you this, if information is not to be used, it has no purpose. If it has no purpose it will not be used. If it is to be used it must be used by something. That something is what I call "mind" (however primitive that mind might be.)

Also, please understand that I do not stand by my beliefs to the point that I am bias. I hope you don't either. If I did, I would never really learn much would I? I am not satisfied with accepting what others believe without good reason. And if their explanations don't add up I keep looking. If they are not logical I don't accept them.

That intelligence suddenly appeared like a miracle is not logical.




My questions are not meant to be rhetorical. And so what if they are? I am attempting to clearly explain the logic and reason behind my belief.

I am hoping someone will address these points with a clear head and open and honest mind.

If they actually have something that can convince me beyond what I've heard, I am willing to consider it. I think in the end we are actually seeing the same thing.

I will explain in another post.

JB,

Not that I am speaking for massage, but when one presupposes reason, purpose, and intent, that necessarily demands a conclusion of design. So all the questions being asked already have colored answers.

I presuppose reason and purpose because of the logic.

What is the reason for reproducing if it is not growth and life? The intention to propagate, reproduce etc. is for growth, life and expansion. If that is the intention, then life is the design. In nature, the driving force is sex and reproduction. The evidence for that can clearly be seen everywhere in all living things.

Oh, I get it.. I didn't mean to be saying that the true answer to your question was definitely in those books - I meant to say (1) that there are valid possible answers (such as the one I would personally give) to that question which cannot even realistically be discussed without having a foundational understanding, and (2) the actual true answer (to that one question, if not the larger questions) might actually be found in those books.



Information, yes.
The ability to compose symphonies, no.
Intelligence - depends on the definition.



Okay... so what are you using as your working definition for intelligence when you say all this?




Good for them! They are aspiring to objectivity. This is a far more reliable approach than insisting that intelligence is there because 'it seems like it should be'.

Consider my earlier comment about organisms being able to reprogram their own DNA - anyone interested in truth should discount that as baseless conjecture.



I meant that in the sense that I know people who appear to be smarter than other people.



No, I didn't say that. I said 'closer' as in 'has one additional quality in common'. In some sense, the color red is 'closer' to blood than the color yellow - but neither is blood...and you can't turn red into blood by making it more red.

If you give me a good working definition of intelligence, I might (or might not) gladly agree that enzymes are intelligent.




I'm starting to realize that you are not as open minded on this topic as I thought you were, and that some of these questions are purely rhetorical.

I cannot answer either question without a good working definition, and I'm not sure we are using the same idea here. I tend to be pretty flexible wrt to the term 'intelligence', but of course I do hate it when people play a shell game with it. In my personal SEMANTIC leanings, enzymes don't have 'intelligence', and there is no magically point - there is a spectrum of varying complexities.

Suppose I start losing hair. Say I have 10 million follicles normally. (Pulled that # out of my butt). If I had zero active hair follicles, clearly I am bald. But if I had 9 million, you wouldn't say I was bald - you might not even recognize that my hair was 'thinning'. At what point do you say I'm bald? Is there a precise definition for this?

I say no. There is no exact point at which you go from 'not bald' to 'bald'. Therefore, baldness is a myth, there is no such thing as baldness. No, wait! I mean, baldness was always there, and every person with hair is actually just a 'little bald', otherwise we would need to have a miraculous point at which 'baldness' suddenly appeared, out of nowhere.

I consider most of the previous paragraph complete nonsense, but I hope it causes someone, somewhere, to think about your argument from a different angle.



It seems you are using the term 'driving force' in a very different way. Maybe we need to define terms before we can talk. As far as my claim, its definitely not 'an assumption' - its born out by evidence, and a set of physical 'laws' which not only have been repeatedly tested, but allow testable predictions to be made. Going back to your previous question, which I think I misunderstood - thermodynamics is not 'only about energy' - it as about EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS. Including: All chemical reactions have a thermodynamic component to them.

All systems tend to seek their lowest energy level, if there is an energically favorable path to that level. This, and other factors, can be said to 'drive' chemical reactions, electrostatics, mechanical interations, on and on. If you don't like the term being used that way, thats your business.



Five years of studying physics, and everything I've personally observed about the universe.



Are you talking about this logic?

1) intelligence exists
2) intelligence can't have come from nowhere!
3) therefore intelligence is in everything

Back when people thought that all you needed was logic, not experimentation, it seems that our species greatest minds thought that heavy things fell faster than light things.


(unless thats a myth I'm propagating, irresponsibly...)




Because I look for reason and purpose or "a point" does NOT MEAN THAT I do not appreciate "what is" and its value. I do.

Well, it looked to me like you were saying that if there is no point, then it is 'no good'.

As far as 'looking for a purpose' - are you looking to see whether there might be a purpose, or do you insist that there must be a purpose and set off to find it, no matter what?



I hope my last question shows that this doesn't follow from my words. I think its great to look for what might be, but a bit presumptuous to look while thinking that it must be.

I think that insisting there must be a purpose is to (a) make an assumption and (b) project that assumption onto reality and (c) set yourself up for mis-interpreting the evidence to fit the assumption.


But I didn't answer your question...



The truth of being! Wow. Is that the same as 'the truth of reality', or does it go deeper? I think most people are happier if they look or believe in a purpose/point, and being emotionally healthy is a good thing.



No, I can't say I do, especially given the lack of definitions. I am happy to be alive, so all the energy and information which allowed that to be has a use for me. I'm not so keen on the 'universal' and 'intrinsic' feeling of your statement, though.



Now I wonder if we have different ideas of what 'bias' means. Funny how words can only get in the way sometimes.



Oh, but I do. If I get an email which says "I've invented a perpetual motion machine! Free energy for all humanity forever! I need an investor!" its going directly to the trash bin, because of my very sane and sensible bias.



I really think that your disagreement with scientists may be largely semantic...and as such, you are setting up straw men without even realizing it.

Its not at all illogical to thinking that a system with one level of coplexity would have different properties than a system with a different level of complexity.




It matters to me because I am often not motivated to debate with people who have already made up their mind. I get far more pleasure out of posing possibilities, presenting reasons, or providing evidence to people who are sincerely engaged in an open inquiry. As several have demonstrated here, a great deal: an alert and creative intelligence thats committed to a belief can generate an endless stream of arguments for whatever they believe in.

JB wrote:



Science does not say that.

"And then a miracle happened..." is a flaw of an argument for intelligent design, not a flaw in scientific thought. Science does not address it like that. While I have seen this type of thought be expressed before in this forum, it is actually being used in reverse, along with the little chalkboard cartoon that goes along with it. That cartoon is an argument against ID not science.

Looking for consistency(common denominators) in things observed is not the same as "a miracle happened". Science does not conclude that 'suddenly' intelligence appeared. Scientists are being logical because of the requirements for knowledge. We can know that intelligence exists. We can know that it exists in degrees. We can know that through recognizing the common demoninators intrinsic in all things known to exhibit intelligence.

We cannot necessarily conclude that there is a reason, let alone what it is. Your approach to the idea presupposes the conclusion in the premise and is therefore circular reasoning.

Of course science does not say that. They would sound stupid if they did.

What I am trying to illustrate is that intelligence is in everything. ..and yes, in degrees. When things combine, grow, and exchange energy and information intelligence GROWS and becomes apparent... to scientists. Before it becomes apparent, it must be assumed and known to exist by pure logic that it has to exist.

It has to exist in all things, because if it does not then you HAVE to declare a point where suddenly "a miracle happened" and now intelligence exists!

Intelligence did not evolve from stupid stuff. It couldn't. It evolved from stuff that already has a degree of intelligence, however small and it had some information, however slight.

This is proof that everything is intelligent to some degree, hence the entire universe is intelligent to some degree. When things within the universe gather to exchange energy and information and to grow and change, intelligence finds a home or 'body' in which to inhabit. All bodies, all matter has energy and information, regardless whether we call it 'alive' or not.

Of course we can conclude anything we want. And NO my idea does not presupposes the conclusion in the premise.

I concluded the reason for reproducing is for growth and life from observation. What other conclusion can you draw?

Can you think of any other logical reason for this activity? This is just logical from the repeated observations of the process.

The observation of the driving force of things reproducing and replicating themselves is the evidence that there is a direction and purpose for this activity towards life and growth. Life finds a way.

The drive is for energy and information exchanges and for growth. Life is the necessary result. Life is necessary for more energy and information exchanges or visa versa.

How do we draw conclusions about intent? Well if a man was chasing me with a gun and shooting at me I would draw the conclusion that he was trying to shoot or kill me. It is an observation.

If a life form develops the drive and instinct to survive and grow and reproduce then I will conclude that survival and growth and reproduction is its intent.

On the other hand, some animals will at some point give up on life and just crawl off to die. I then can conclude that they have ceased their struggle to survive, and they have run out of energy to try.

All my conclusions are temporary. I have them for a reason. I have not "made up my mind" about anything.

It seems that you are having difficulty understanding my terms.

Intelligence:
How about:
Having energy and information and using it.




Sort of but not quite.

1) intelligence exists
2) intelligence can't have come from no-intelligence
3) therefore everything that exists has a degree of intelligence

The reason for this logic is:

If intelligence can arise from no-intelligence THEN
you have to identify the point where a miracle happened and
suddenly there was intelligence.

Well, the people who demand that everything must be logical are automatically demanding that the universe must be intelligent.

They equate being logical to being intelligent. Then they demand that everything in the universe must have a logical explanation, therefore, they are themselves, demanding that the universe must be intelligent as a prerequisite assumption.

Logic is always circular. There's no getting around it. It's like a dog chasing its own tail. The very act of demanding that everything must have a logical explanation is to demand that the universe must have been intelligently designed.

And this is your belief, right? You are not asking whether intelligence is in everything - you have decided that it is.



I've often spoken poorly of the formal study of the specific opinions of long dead philosophers who just happened - by force of personality or position in society or successful marketing or convenient timing in historical development - to become 'recognized philosophers'.

But I must admit that the errors of past philosophers can be really helpful to us - helping us to avoid the same mistakes.

Such as the mistaking of placing trust in 'pure logic', alone, as a means to truth. More so if you are not even rigorous in the application of logic. Even more so if the conclusion has emotional appeal.



This is an excellent example of a 'straw man' argument. You present only two possible options here, and presuppose a specific and conveniently chosen form of the second option.

Why 'must' a person declare that a miracle happens?



How do you know?

Based on your statements, it sounds like you believe that: because you cannot think of another answer, the answer you can think of must be the truth.



Your conclusion is a sound one, but it doesn't make it correct, and it doesn't make it an 'observation'. He might be shooting at a person in front of you. He might be trying to scare you. He might be trying to make a scene/diversion, and not care whether you get hit.

This is just like the issue mentioned above in the application of logic - people think that by listing a limited set of cases, and disproving some of them, that what remains must be true. That is entirely false. In this case (man with gun) I would conclude that he is trying to shoot me because I would not be thinking of the alternative explanations, if faced with that situation.

I don't feel that this is reflected in the way that you are phrasing your statements in this topic.



Yes!



Having energy and information and using it. Now I wonder what you mean by 'using it', as the way in which I use my computer seems different to me from the way in which my computer uses electricity. Are we presupposing intention with the word 'using' ?

Does an energy + information system need a 'purpose' before it can 'use' its energy/information ?

But if you are simply saying "MT0-intelligence = having energy and information, and interacting with other things comprising energy and information", the yes I would say that enzymes and rocks have MT0-intelligence. By definition, I suppose everything in the universe has MT0-intelligence.

But that is a very relaxed definition for MT0-intelligence, which seems to have little in common with the way the word is often used in everyday speech.



So lets set aside the fact that I agree that everything in the universe has MT0-intelligence, and look at whether this is really a logical argument.



This is so strange to me.

(A) intelligence can arise from no-intelligence
(B) you have to identify the point where a miracle happened and
suddenly there was intelligence.

You are saying, IF A, then B ? As a matter of pure logic?

(A) reads like a proposition, but (B) reads like an opinion about a persons actions, complete with prejudiced, loaded language.

The truth value of (A) is completely independent of any individuals ability to differentiate between intelligence and non-intelligence, much less determine 'the exact point' at which the line is drawn between the two.

I wonder if what you mean to say is:

(A) intelligence can arise from no-intelligence
(B) there is a point in time before which there was no-intelligence, after which there is intelligence

If A, then B.



This might appear to be logical... but can baldness arise in a person with a full head of hair?

(A) Baldness can arise in a person with a full head of hair
(B) There is a point in time before which the person was not bald, and after which he is bald.

If A, then B.

It seems to me that there is no such point in time. By the logic given above, it would seem that I've proven the people with full heads of hair cannot become bald.

I'll bite???

Pan, I am critiquing JB's argument. I believe this is a fair summary:



I'm not asking if you agree with any of the premises or conclusions - but since you are offering to bite, I'm asking if you agree that this is an absolute logical proof.