Principia

I think it would help all of us that are making an honest effort to understand mturner to reread the above quote. His choice of words seems to be so saturated with assumptions that there is an observer external to the systems (e.g. the use of the words 'signifies' or 'abstracted' or 'existence' of the systems). I can appreciate a non-standard use of 'intelligence,' but it seems like we are using a whole different vocabulary here.

Anyways, the argument that a snowflake 'signifies nothing' is unclear. It probably has no biological function, but does that necessarily mean it has no function at all? mturner's definition of 'meaningful' information at the moment requires that there is a triadic relationship. He qualifies the snowflake as dyadic simply because he can't fathom what the receiver is. However, there is no reason offered why the triadic system cannot be viewed merely as a physical process involving the interactions of the sender and the receiver (beyond mturner's objections of Materialist philosophy, of course).

In truth, the snowflake also interacts with its environment (i.e. it does not exist in isolation). Its very structure determines its growth. What does a snowflake interact with? Well in fairness, what does a snowflake interact with in a 'meaningful' manner? I have already described such an interaction above. But, the following thought experiment may prove useful. Suppose we categorize *all* possible snowflakes that are of radius R from center to its hexagonal vertex. Then we consider *all* possible snowflakes of radius R+dR. I am willing to bet that there is a non-trivial mapping (i.e. not necessarily one-to-one, possibly degenerate) that any one snowflake in the first set can evolve over time into the second. Have I not just described a sender-code-receiver (i.e. triadic) system? The code would just be the arrangement of H2O molecules at the complex boundary of the snowflake.

Anybody else sees a problem with this analogy?

SC

[ March 18, 2002: Message edited by: Scientiae ]</p>

mturner

Hi Daniel,

Thank-you for your polite, respectful response. I very much appreciate that sort of thing.

I have no critique of any of it. Of course it's a given that I am not a materialist, and that I do not see the abstract as simply an epiphenomenon of mass/energy. But that is simply a statement of our differing opinions, and cannot be debated directly, but only through critiquing whatever empirical evidence is offered in support of those metaphysical opinions. Since you offer no evidence of the truth of your assumption that the abstract is nothing but an epiphenomenon of mass/energy, I have nothing to critique. Your descriptions of code, etc., seem correct to me.

You ask if I can clarify my definition of Intelligence, which you find to be 'non-standard'. I have defined it, at its most basic, as the ability to learn; that is, to acquire knowledge and act upon it. I believe that this a standard definition. See:

n·tel·li·gence (ĭn-tĕl'ə-jəns)
n.

The capacity to acquire and apply knowledge.
The faculty of thought and reason.
Superior powers of mind. See synonyms at mind.
An intelligent, incorporeal being, especially an angel.
Information; news. See synonyms at news.

Secret information, especially about an actual or potential enemy.
An agency, staff, or office employed in gathering such information.
Espionage agents, organizations, and activities considered as a group: “Intelligence is nothing if not an institutionalized black market in perishable commodities” (John le Carré).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

Dictionary.com carries the same definition. Harcourt Brace's "Academic Press Dictionary of Science and Technology", gives us:

intelligence Psychology. a general term encompassing various mental abilities, including the ability to remember and use what one has learned, in order to solve problems, adapt to new situations, and understand and manipulate one's environment. Behavior. as applied to the activities of animals, the capacity to show a change in behavior as the result of experience.

I believe that my definition is in line with these definitions, if not with the various definitions of intelligence which describe it anthropomorphically, as a capacity limited to human beings. The belief that 'intelligence' should be defined by a description of all of the properties of human intelligence, and thus confined solely to some, (not all), human beings, and extended to no other organisms, is, I believe, passe in scientific circles.

pax.

mturner

leonarde

mturner,
Good luck with these snowflake-believers: their
superstitions are passing strange. I too did at
ARN a most humongo(u)s dictionary employ and the
definitions were brushed off like a light powdering upon the stoop.
Know you that I do rant in the nether regions
of this kingdom? We have the Winter Fairies to
thank for that: perhaps we should make this our
new abode!

mturner

**
Good my Liege,

Yea, verily, I have visited this dungeon and have enjoyed the sparkle of thy noble wit, but I like not the company. Wherefore dost thou spurn thy friends, and the warm and jolly ambiance of conviviality in the bright and cheery coffeehouse that Sir Richi hath provided? Come away and forget that place of flying spittle, stomping feet, and constant flatulance. 'Tis beneath thee, forsooth!

Prince M.

owleye

mturner...

I now understand you to be saying that the intelligence is in the bio-chemistry (for example, in the cell nucleus) that is able to read the code from the form in which it is stored in nucleotide sequences.

Though I think this makes a certain amount of sense, and I do appreciate this clarification, I'm wondering why the code is needed at all? Isn't it possible that the intelligence could carry out its task without a code? Indeed, I could easily interpret this relationship to be the complete reversal of the way you understand it. It is my understanding that this genetic code is so structured that it contains all the necessary instructions for creating the "intelligence" that you might be attributing to the reading of the code, and, as such, it is the code that is the master, while the "intelligence" merely serves it.

owleye

mturner

Hi owleye;
I can't see how it is possible to communicate without a mutually understood code of some kind.
I don't see this communication as a master/servant relationship. Certainly not the code as master to the receiver. The code is simply an arrangement of chemicals, but the organisms, both sender and receiver, are alive. You might wish to interpret the relationship as the sending organism giving an order in writing to be passed on to a subordinate, but I prefer to see it as a co-operative process, a teaching experience whereby acquired knowledge is passed on to the next generation. In which case the code is no more intelligent than a set of task instructions chalked on a blackboard, and the teacher/student relationship is student oriented. In my metaphor, at least.

Of course, a Materialist can claim that life is merely an epiphenomenon of mass/energy, and so there is no essential difference between the living and the non-living. I don't think that such a claim will withstand close scrutiny, however.

pax,

mturner

owleye

mturner...

"I can't see how it is possible to communicate without a mutually understood code of some kind."

Why is communication a requirement for intelligence? What is there to communicate with? (Having read further, I take it you mean "the child generation" is what a "the parent generation" communicates to (with?)).


"You might wish to interpret the relationship as the sending organism giving an order in writing to be passed on to a subordinate, but I prefer to see it as a co-operative process, a teaching experience whereby acquired knowledge is passed on to the next generation."

Doesn't this imply that the intelligence / knowledge is in the code? Otherwise, how does the next generation receive this intelligence / knowledge? Secondly, the transferrence of the code to the next generation is a one-way street. In what way do you conceive this to be two-way communication?

owleye

Ierrellus

DNA is as much of a system of data as is any other chemical information provided to an organism. If the brain is a product of DNA, it is electro-chemical, genetic/evolutionary and sensory/ somatic in sources of data.

Data must be explored from its sources, not from preconceived ideas of what it must be. Data is that which can be translated into activity, which to us humans is experential.

Ierrellus

mturner

**
Hi owl,

I didn't say that communication is a requirement for intelligence; I said that intelligence is a requirement for communication.

**
Intelligence and knowledge are not the same thing. Knowledge is contained within the coded message. The intelligence is contained solely within the sender and the receiver.


**
No intelligence is transmitted, only knowledge/information/instructions.

In the case of DNA, which we are discussing, it's one-way only.

pax,

mturner

owleye

mturner...

"No intelligence is transmitted, only knowledge/information/instructions.

In the case of DNA, which we are discussing, it's one-way only."

If intelligence is necessary for transmitting DNA to the next generation (which I would have to understand to be a species of communication of DNA to the next generation), what ought we to say of the parent generation in mitosis, where the daughter cells split off from the parent cell?

The DNA, in the form of a double helix nucleotide sequence, splits into two equal parts (if it does this "correctly," that is -- mistakes are sometimes made) and each part matches up with appropriate nucleotide pairs to form a new double helix, and, at roughly the same time, the cell and its nucleus divide into two cells. Wouldn't we say the same machinery that permits mitosis to occur has been copied to the next generation? Thus, wouldn't intelligence be transmitted along with the DNA, during its replication?

Since it becomes difficult to disentangle which part of the "transmission" belongs to the parent and which part is created as a result of the cell division process, I suspect we would have to regard the "intelligence" that is duplicated as no longer in the parent generation, this being quite lost in the division, but is now duplicated in the daughter generation.

Anyway, this is how I would have to translate it. How do you understand mitosis?

owleye