First of all, I have not heard any better alternatives to consider. And second, you have never met a person with a more open mind than mine. You don't know me well enough to make those kinds of judgments. It appears to me that you have your mind quite made up already and are quite happy and comfortable with your conclusions.

If you have no better alternatives, or answers other than telling me to go read some books there is nothing for me to open my mind for.

Who says it can't? You? LOL

You can watch intelligence appear slowly in evolution.

I agree.

I also see some closed minds claiming openness.

Nature is the processes of life. From the very incept to the evolution to survive.

Logic says it can't.

I am NOT talking about what a human observer can perceive or observe. I am talking about actuality.

If intelligence grows and makes it appearance gradually, then it already exists in everything.

If there EVER was a time or a thing in which there was no intelligence involved then there HAS TO BE A POINT where it (intelligence) was born or emerged.

This is so very simple and logical I don't understand why you can understand it.

It is like a point between existence and non existence.

Your logic?

(sigh)

(sigh). What is going on here? I thought you were attempting to set out logical proofs.





Do you agree that I have shown that, in general, a quality can arise gradually? What is it about intelligence, specifically, which leads you to conclude that it cannot gradually appear? There must be something intrinsic to intelligence, which makes it different than baldness. What is that, exactly?

See, this paragraph above where you make claims about intelligence - a silly person could make the same claims about baldness. How is intelligence intrinsically different?

You have already said, yourself, that you see intelligence as relative, so you are likely to accept that a spectrum is possible. Why not a spectrum which also has a flatline region of 'zero intelligence' ?

You say there is no intention in nature, and you define nature as the processes of life.

If that is your definition of nature then I can understand why you say there is no intention in nature. A "process" is not an entity and is not capable of intention. It is just a process.

But you also said:
"Now accidental design does happen in nature. But there is no intention there."

If you can't make a determination of intention behind a design, then why do you think you can make a determination of "no intention" being behind a design?

I don't see how you could know that other than it being your opinion.

JB,

Very little of what you've said in this thread qualifies as a valid logical proof. Its a 'argument' of sorts. I just want to be clear. I wonder at your repeated use of the word 'logic'. We would not be having this argument if you had not claimed that your sequence of statements was 'logic'.

Have you studied logic at all? I mean, either in school, or in a book that explains the mechanism of logic, the common fallacies? I don't think such is necessary - a person in silent self examination can derive most of that on their own, but I'm curious about your exposure. You've invoked a few logical fallacies in this thread, and you seemed to be unaware of them. If you want to speculate, or make an argument for something - why claim that its a matter of pure logic?


It seems to me that by 'pure logic' you mean 'conjecture devoid of evidence' - but at first I thought you meant 'this is shown to be absolutely, necessarily true by simply, unassailable logic'.




I'm commenting on your statements and the appearance of your thought process (as reflected in those statements), not your person. Take another look if you have any doubts.



What are my conclusions? What claims have I put forward in this thread?



Given that I've lived in over a dozen cities, and make a hobby of talking to random strangers in the public space about serious topics, this seems very unlikely.

Of course, we are all exchanging opinions. I am no better than you and your opinions.

Because zero does not exist.

I said that I agree that intelligence can gradually "grow." But in order to grow it must first exist however small and insignificant.

It cannot grow from zero. It has to exist in order to grow and appear to "make a gradual appearance." That is the logic.

If you want, you can break it down into the smallest quanta of intelligence that you can imagine. But it has to exist in order to grow.

IF (a big if) a state of no-intelligence exists or existed at any point, there HAS TO BE A POINT where it went from non-existence to existence.

Intelligence is not a 'quality." (like baldness) it is a state of awareness or function that operates via energy and information.

It is a state that functions because of information (encoding) and energy.

Can't get something from nothing? That is the ultimate question.

But in truth no matter what "logic" anyone uses we always get down to the FACT that something does come from nothing or nothing would exist.

There is no other way.


How does something come from nothing?

Noone has the answer to that one yet.

One day we will know.

Where does intelligence come from?

A designer?

Where does the designer come from?

Another designer?

Where does that designer come from?

A star?

Where did that star come from?

Etc..... into infinity


Eventually you get to the fact that something started from nothing.

By "pure logic" I mean that it is logic devoid of objective evidence. Pure logic is completely subjective evidence.

Completely subjective evidence via logic is necessary when you are piercing the veil of objective science.

Where the theory of intelligence is concerned where does science stand? Please enlighten me. Does science state that intelligence appears gradually via evolution? Are they considering the micro world of quantum interaction? enzymes? cells? etc.

At what point (in general) does biology seem to think intelligence emerged? A dog? A human? An ape? A worm? A bird?

If you break intelligence down to the quantum level, how much intelligence can an element have? Zero? If so, what can it do with zero intelligence? Nothing. It can't even interact by my definition of intelligence. It can't use its energy or encoding for anything or it lacks one or the other.

No, my favorite argument is that nothing does not exist.

That is not a logical derivation, thats a collection of claims.

With these words, you seem to completely discount the possibility that non-intelligence can grow into intelligence. That might be your belief, but it is not a logical necessity.



And if a person cannot point their finger at that point, we can logically conclude it doesn't exist? Is that what you were trying to suggest earlier in this thread?




...which sounds like a quality to me.

Um - I'm speechless. I feel that we have gotten somewhere, at least we have uncovered something previously covered, but I'm not sure what this gains us. Did you develop this nomenclature on your own?



I'm not here to make baseless claims. I do know (from personal experience) that real scientists usually do an excellent job of ensuring their terms are meaningful.




It seems to me that your definition of intelligence is close to being just a word for 'matter and energy'. You have chosen a definition which ensures that everything has intelligence.

Or so you claim.

Someone else could claim that prayer is necessary.

Another could claim that 'admitting you don't know' is necessary.

All three positions agree on the only thing which is definite - you have abandoned the evidence based approach.

Not absolute, only because I don't believe that everything has intelligence. I think that a single particle of whatever the core component of quarks(or smaller) are CANNOT have intelligence.

But I really wanted to hear the baldness thing, I saw an error in the premise and was wondering where you were headed with that.

From my point of view, my opinion about the 'truth' of a conclusion is separate from my estimation of the validity of a logical argument.
So whether we personally, previously agree or disagree with the conclusion, we can still aspire to an objective evaluation of merit of a logical proof.





I was creating a mirror image of JB's logic, using another quality (baldness instead of intelligence), to explore the merits of her argument exactly as it was stated.