Evolution without intelligence?

[secret2]

My post was not an argument. Sorry for not making it clearer. I was looking for a good answer I could give a creationist if he or she uses the symmetry thing in their argument.

OK I see your point. In that case ask her why her heart is not right at the centre of her body.

 

[Heathen Hammer]

Can someone explain how random actions without intelligence guiding them can assemble 3 blocks in a stack. It does not have to be perfect but as long as it is balanced by random actions you win..

Yes, I can.

From your brief description I will assume you allow for a few things:

1. the blocks are naturally cubical; in other words, I don't need to go a step back to explain how cubes come about in the first place
2. the environment in which the cubes exist allows either occasional natural movement or descent of the cubes. In other words the landscape is not totally static, and there is gravity.

Since the cubes have naturally flat surfaces, they will always fall flat-on to the lowest surface they find themselves on. Whether they are tossed into the air by some vibration or drop from heights, unless they shatter or pierce into a soft surface on a point or edge they will always wind up falling naturally onto one of their flat surfaces. This being teh case if a cube winds up coming down upon another unbroken cube, by natural physics it is entirely possible that one will sit atop another. If there are enough such events eventually the odds allow that a third might happen to land atop an already-established pile and not knock the other two down.

In an environment with enough whole cubes, and enough energy [providing movement] and enough events of cube movement you will eventually wind up with 3 stacked cubes. All without any intelligent influence whatsoever.

 

[Thief]

Everyone has heard of the watch analogy.

I purpose a simpler one. My one year old son can stack 3 square blocks using his basic intelligence. Can someone explain how random actions without intelligence guiding them can assemble 3 blocks in a stack. It does not have to be perfect but as long as it is balanced by random actions you win.

The building blocks of life are much more complicated to stack and improper stacking would end life.

Looking forward to an answer. Thanks.

So far this thread is miss using the word 'random'.
Repeated action is included in 'random'.

As for the little guy stacking blocks....consider the opposite situation.
What if he showed no ability to do so?
Would the parent not worry the condition of his being?

Ability is the outward evidence of what goes on inside.
Unless someone is guiding his hand....or displaying example....
The child is acting on his own volition.

 

[idea]

So far this thread is miss using the word 'random'.

I think this thread needs to discuss another word - intelligence.

It would be interesting to hear everyone's definition of what intelligence is, where it comes from, and what it creates.

wiki's first sentence about it:
" Intelligence has been defined in many different ways including, but not limited to, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, reasoning, learning, having emotional knowledge, retaining, planning, and problem solving."

 

[secret2]

I think this thread needs to discuss another word - intelligence.

It would be interesting to hear everyone's definition of what intelligence is, where it comes from, and what it creates.

wiki's first sentence about it:
" Intelligence has been defined in many different ways including, but not limited to, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, reasoning, learning, having emotional knowledge, retaining, planning, and problem solving."

Your loaded questions already bear too much presumptions.

 

[Thief]

I think this thread needs to discuss another word - intelligence.

It would be interesting to hear everyone's definition of what intelligence is, where it comes from, and what it creates.

wiki's first sentence about it:
" Intelligence has been defined in many different ways including, but not limited to, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, reasoning, learning, having emotional knowledge, retaining, planning, and problem solving."

It would also help to note....the item evolving need not be intelligent.

With intelligence installed the item at hand can make decisions that increase the effect.

With no ability to make a decision, the evolution is still there....
but the life form is caught in the moment.
Such as seeds of plant life.

 

[camanintx]

I think this thread needs to discuss another word - intelligence.

It would be interesting to hear everyone's definition of what intelligence is, where it comes from, and what it creates.

wiki's first sentence about it:
" Intelligence has been defined in many different ways including, but not limited to, abstract thought, understanding, self-awareness, communication, reasoning, learning, having emotional knowledge, retaining, planning, and problem solving."

I'll accept wiki's definition. As for where it comes from, I suspect it has something to do with the complexity of the feedback loops present in neural activity. Asking what it creates is a very open-ended question.

 

[Tiberius]

Everyone has heard of the watch analogy.

I purpose a simpler one. My one year old son can stack 3 square blocks using his basic intelligence. Can someone explain how random actions without intelligence guiding them can assemble 3 blocks in a stack. It does not have to be perfect but as long as it is balanced by random actions you win.

The building blocks of life are much more complicated to stack and improper stacking would end life.

Looking forward to an answer. Thanks.

In small steps.

Jumble them around, and you can get one block on top of another block.

 

[MD]

I think it's a good question and I've pondered it myself. Currently we think that evolution has resulted in the creation of purpose from purposeless matter. To continuously propagate ones genes is purpose. My personal opinion is that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality and as such all matter is conscious, which might have been involved in the creation of the first self replicating RNA.

 

[otokage007]

Everyone has heard of the watch analogy.

I purpose a simpler one. My one year old son can stack 3 square blocks using his basic intelligence. Can someone explain how random actions without intelligence guiding them can assemble 3 blocks in a stack. It does not have to be perfect but as long as it is balanced by random actions you win.

The building blocks of life are much more complicated to stack and improper stacking would end life.

Looking forward to an answer. Thanks.

I'm sure that if the three blocks are throwed randomly during some thousand million years, they will assemble in a stack at least once. So did the life components.

Of course the "origin of life" is a very improbable event, that's why we only have life on Earth (as far as we know). Don't u think that if we had some "watchmaker" out there, it would be quite weird that he did not put life also into mars and stuff?

 

[Thief]

I'm sure that if the three blocks are throwed randomly during some thousand million years, they will assemble in a stack at least once. So did the life components.

Of course the "origin of life" is a very improbable event, that's why we only have life on Earth (as far as we know). Don't u think that if we had some "watchmaker" out there, it would be quite weird that he did not put life also into mars and stuff?

Chemistry has rules.

Picture yourself as the Creator...yes you can.
Having made all of these spheres of chemistry.....then what?

You find yourself alone.
You are the First and very much alone.
Setting yourself in more than one place seems possible...in spirit.
But you are then talking to your own Echo.

Then only solution is chemistry.
Set spirit into physical form and turn it loose.
The spirit will develop it's own perspective as it moves about.

When it dies....it comes back to you.
And you finally have someone to talk to.

Not all of the planets are suitable for life.
Chemistry has rules.

 

[otokage007]

Chemistry has rules.

Picture yourself as the Creator...yes you can.
Having made all of these spheres of chemistry.....then what?

You find yourself alone.
You are the First and very much alone.
Setting yourself in more than one place seems possible...in spirit.
But you are then talking to your own Echo.

Then only solution is chemistry.
Set spirit into physical form and turn it loose.
The spirit will develop it's own perspective as it moves about.

When it dies....it comes back to you.
And you finally have someone to talk to.

Not all of the planets are suitable for life.
Chemistry has rules.

From a theological perspective, chemistry has only the rules God want it to have. And I'm sure God doesn't care if "mars is not suited to life", because if he wanted life on mars, he would simply put life on mars and chemistry wouldn't dare defy him.

 

[Heathen Hammer]

I won the thread on page 3. What are you still doing here?

 

[Me Myself]

Everyone has heard of the watch analogy.

I purpose a simpler one. My one year old son can stack 3 square blocks using his basic intelligence. Can someone explain how random actions without intelligence guiding them can assemble 3 blocks in a stack. It does not have to be perfect but as long as it is balanced by random actions you win.

The building blocks of life are much more complicated to stack and improper stacking would end life.

Looking forward to an answer. Thanks.

Random is a very confusing word.

Oxford dictionary:

Random:

made, done, happening, or chosen without method or conscious decision


Well, there is little explanation needed really.

What is the "how" that you would not be able to get? random means without a conscious decision, so that would be the how. Now you may think, but how can something made without a conscious decision be done "correctly" but then you would have to realize that "correctly" is a conscious perception of your mind.

You see the sun coming out every day and you see a bunch of patterns in nature and simply because you see that YOU must make things consciously for them to work for YOU in a way YOU deem "correct" then "obviously" everything must work like you right?

I mean, everything goes around us humans right?

If we can only do things well by conscious decisions, then how can reality work in any other way? Have someone moved us from the center of the universe already or something?

 

[Looncall]

I think it's a good question and I've pondered it myself. Currently we think that evolution has resulted in the creation of purpose from purposeless matter. To continuously propagate ones genes is purpose. My personal opinion is that consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality and as such all matter is conscious, which might have been involved in the creation of the first self replicating RNA.

What do you mean by reality? Can you show that the term consciousness can be meaningfully applied to that?

At first glance "consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality" looks like a category error, and therefore meaningless. Consider the famous square triangle for a similar instance.

 

[MD]

What do you mean by reality? Can you show that the term consciousness can be meaningfully applied to that?

At first glance "consciousness is a fundamental aspect of reality" looks like a category error, and therefore meaningless. Consider the famous square triangle for a similar instance.

I don't think our universe only consists of matter and energy, because that would make it a purely objective universe. Yet subjective experiences exist and should not exist within a purely objective universe. I think there is another aspect to our universe, and that is consciousness. It's not the same consciousness that we experience, something more rudimentary.

 

[Looncall]

I don't think our universe only consists of matter and energy, because that would make it a purely objective universe. Yet subjective experiences exist and should not exist within a purely objective universe. I think there is another aspect to our universe, and that is consciousness. It's not the same consciousness that we experience, something more rudimentary.

What do you mean by subjective and objective here?

Please justify your statement that I have bolded.

 

[MD]

What do you mean by subjective and objective here?

Please justify your statement that I have bolded.

I'm talking about qualia with regards to subjectivity. An objective universe should be one that is made purely of matter and energy and as such if it were true we shouldn't have these subjective experiences.

 

[PolyHedral]

I'm talking about qualia with regards to subjectivity. An objective universe should be one that is made purely of matter and energy and as such if it were true we shouldn't have these subjective experiences.

Sure we would; we've all got different brains.

 

[MD]

Sure we would; we've all got different brains.

But how do our brains create qualia? You can't get such experiences from nothing.