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Author Topic:   Higher Intelligence
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 31 of 53 (468414)
05-29-2008 10:31 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by Fosdick
05-28-2008 7:08 PM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
So an organism needs to be a chordate to be "intelligent"?
Yeah, but not all chordates are intelligent.
How come?
I think you need the highly developed brain for the higher brain function required for the mental capacity to make conscious decision to be intelligent.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 17 by Fosdick, posted 05-28-2008 7:08 PM Fosdick has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 34 by Fosdick, posted 05-29-2008 12:01 PM New Cat's Eye has replied
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New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 32 of 53 (468416)
05-29-2008 10:33 AM
Reply to: Message 29 by Iblis
05-29-2008 1:27 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
I see them more as robots than having some overarching intelligence.
Well that's fine, but we don't want to be calling them well-designed robots, that's right out the window!
Why? Evolution designed them quite well.
So let's call it a different kind of intelligence, to start with. And see what blows up!
Meh. I'm not that interested. Post something of substance so I have something to reply too.
I've seen some commentary here to the effect that people who can't understand evolution also don't seem to understand their own thinking process. If they are the same thing, or the same kind of thing, that would make a lot of sense, wouldn't it?
Um, no... not really.

This message is a reply to:
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Fosdick 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5500 days)
Posts: 1793
From: Upper Slobovia
Joined: 12-11-2006


Message 33 of 53 (468425)
05-29-2008 11:33 AM
Reply to: Message 22 by Iblis
05-28-2008 9:25 PM


Designer fixation and Darwinian selection
But, I need a free science lesson really bad. It's not for me, it's for the kids!
Here's an idea for you to consider. I suspect you have a bad case of "designer fixation," which is contagious amongst true believers, especially Christians. This is evident in your assertion that Darwinian evolution has "intelligence." That notion is as biologically incorrect as the idea of sponge wearing square pants and calling himself Bob.
But you don't need to be beaten up over this mistake. I blame Darwin for your misconception. If he had chosen another word besides "selection" to explain how populations evolve, you might be less confused. "Selection," to many people, implies intent, purpose, planning, and design. I would prefer instead the word "elimination" to describe how a population rids itself of its weaker members.
Maybe you should revise your thinking to allow for an "Intelligent Eliminator." Or maybe not.
”HM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 22 by Iblis, posted 05-28-2008 9:25 PM Iblis has replied

Replies to this message:
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Fosdick 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5500 days)
Posts: 1793
From: Upper Slobovia
Joined: 12-11-2006


Message 34 of 53 (468431)
05-29-2008 12:01 PM
Reply to: Message 31 by New Cat's Eye
05-29-2008 10:31 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
CS writes:
I think you need the highly developed brain for the higher brain function required for the mental capacity to make conscious decision to be intelligent.
And I think intelligence appears in nature by degrees. I admit to seeing intelligence in a termite colony, a race horse, and in body politic.
Can consciousness be dissociated from intelligence? Can a person have "higher consciousness" and still be less "intelligent." Can the Dalai Lama solve Fermat's last thoerem?
I believe I have intelligence and/or consciousness that can be viewed on a broad scale that includes even plants and fungi. Is intelligence or consciousness anything more than an extended phenotype that confers survival benefits? Some animals grew antennae to gather information and survive. Some grew long noses. And some grew fancier feathers. We grew fancier brains.
I also take notice that plants grow fancier and more beautiful reproductive organs than humans do. By comparison, I'd say flowers are more beautiful than our sexual counterparts. But that's a subjective argument.
”HM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by New Cat's Eye, posted 05-29-2008 10:31 AM New Cat's Eye has replied

Replies to this message:
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New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 35 of 53 (468433)
05-29-2008 12:23 PM
Reply to: Message 34 by Fosdick
05-29-2008 12:01 PM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
I wouldn't call that "intelligence" and it certainly doesn't fit the dictionary definition.
I think a different word for it would be better.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 34 by Fosdick, posted 05-29-2008 12:01 PM Fosdick has not replied

  
ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 36 of 53 (468434)
05-29-2008 12:23 PM
Reply to: Message 31 by New Cat's Eye
05-29-2008 10:31 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Yet, isn't the cuttlefish as intelligent as a dog? And some octopus are as intelligence.
Those are not chordates

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by New Cat's Eye, posted 05-29-2008 10:31 AM New Cat's Eye has replied

Replies to this message:
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New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 37 of 53 (468435)
05-29-2008 12:40 PM
Reply to: Message 36 by ramoss
05-29-2008 12:23 PM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Yet, isn't the cuttlefish as intelligent as a dog? And some octopus are as intelligence.
Those are not chordates
Oh, good call!
I hadn't thought of those. Thanks for the contribution.
There's probably not some line we can draw that everything above is, and everything below is not, intelligient.
Its fun to try though.
At least, you need a well developed brain to have intelligence.

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onifre
Member (Idle past 2950 days)
Posts: 4854
From: Dark Side of the Moon
Joined: 02-20-2008


Message 38 of 53 (468506)
05-29-2008 7:21 PM
Reply to: Message 30 by New Cat's Eye
05-29-2008 10:28 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
When I decide to not eat the cheesecake even though I'm hungry, its not a response to the environment.
Well your a human, your environment is aware of weight issues, sugar issues, bad dieting issues etc..., what if your decision was based on one of those reasons? Wouldn't that decision to put down the cheescake be a response to the environment you live in?
Do you think someone who lives in Sub Saharan Africa is going to put down that cheesecake? Different environmental influences don't you think?
That's not a bad place to draw it, I guess. Honestly though, its all conjecture (mine too). I would draw it after the awareness for the benefit and before the want to pass it on.
For shooo
Whales and Dolphins. Elephants. Lions.
Well as long as its not one of the one's we eat right?!
I used to think that but I now believe that non-human animals do have non-zero levels of intelligence. Our's is so exponentially higher that there's seems like zero, but they ehibit some characteristics of intelligence that I would put them at non-zero.
Agreed
Oh wait. You said full use. Hrm. Is our's even full use?
But I did say full Seems to be, but as we get smarter we'll learn to use it better. Assuming of course that ID never gets taught in schools.

All great truths begin as blasphemies

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Buzsaw
Inactive Member


Message 39 of 53 (468513)
05-29-2008 8:06 PM
Reply to: Message 11 by New Cat's Eye
05-28-2008 11:52 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Early writes:
spiders presumably didn't have as complex webs as they do now.
This is one of the reasons I go with ID sudden biological creation. The species have a hard enough time surviving with all they have allegedly added bit by bit to become, the complex creatures thay are for survival. One wonders how they ever suvived when they first allegedly began developing primitive incomplete survival features.

BUZSAW B 4 U 2 C Y BUZ SAW.
The immeasurable present eternally extends the infinite past and infinitely consumes the eternal future.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 11 by New Cat's Eye, posted 05-28-2008 11:52 AM New Cat's Eye has replied

Replies to this message:
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Iblis
Member (Idle past 3895 days)
Posts: 663
Joined: 11-17-2005


Message 40 of 53 (468515)
05-29-2008 8:25 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by Fosdick
05-29-2008 11:33 AM


Re: Designer fixation and Darwinian selection
Hoot Mon writes:
I suspect you have a bad case of "designer fixation," which is contagious amongst true believers
Sorry no, you clearly have me mistaken for someone who gives a shit. I have no cherished preconceived notions or fixed ideas that I would be willing to debate in a science class. But if I did, I certainly wouldn't stick them right out there in my initial hypothesis. That would be asinine!
I would go at it in a proper academic manner like C S Lewis does (imitating Aristotle and Machiavelli.) I would start with something I felt was demonstrably false that I could mischaracterize as the "exact opposite" of my actual fav and knock it down. Then I would systematically knock down each idea between that one and mine, using less and less resources each time. Finally I would get to my punchline idea and go So look, it must be true.
That's not really science though, it's more in the field of education.
If he had chosen another word besides "selection"
Nope, I know exactly what is meant by selection, I know what figures of speech are. I've even specified random selection, I've harped on the whole random thing a lot and will continue to do so. No one is going around like Maxwell's demon and making 74% of your responses inappropriate to your market category, you just need to review your commercial targeting. Shit happens! "Selection" is when shit happens, to shit. Complexity is when stuff that happens to the shit back there contributes to the content, but not the final outcome, of shit here, in big interlinking chains.
"Intelligent Eliminator."
But yeah sure, when we talk about selection the actual thing that is happening is non-selection, elimination. I expect I will prefer to speak of it as filtering.
Darwinian evolution has "intelligence."
I changed that to "is intelligence". I think I have a decent chance at "is like intelligence" when that fails but I would rather keep trying to clean up these raggedy shreds I'm getting from the Gaia hippies and maybe do a decent compare and contrast before I go changing the main terminology again. Christ man, there are plenty of holes in that thesis part still that have got to go!
Not that you aren't helping a lot there too, thanks.
Google
I don't know if intelligence is the right word for google. It has a lot of information in it, and it does some topdown statistical analysis to help you get at the data, and you yourself select what you want. That's a nice theatrical example of a relatively small stochastic process which nevertheless has that "feels smart" quality that is emergent from a complex system.
I will come back to this when we get to talking about Turing I think.
flatworms
Isn't there something in this story, about flatworms or planaria or some such germs, which were taught these simple maze tricks with the electrical shocks, and then they cut those germs up, and fed them to a different set of germs, and that new population then knew that maze without being taught?
I will dig around amongst my science-related journals and see if I can find that issue of Swamp Thing

This message is a reply to:
 Message 33 by Fosdick, posted 05-29-2008 11:33 AM Fosdick has replied

Replies to this message:
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New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 41 of 53 (468557)
05-30-2008 8:36 AM
Reply to: Message 39 by Buzsaw
05-29-2008 8:06 PM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Early writes:
spiders presumably didn't have as complex webs as they do now.
This is one of the reasons I go with ID sudden biological creation. The species have a hard enough time surviving with all they have allegedly added bit by bit to become, the complex creatures thay are for survival. One wonders how they ever suvived when they first allegedly began developing primitive incomplete survival features.
Lots and lots of them giving it a shot. Less competitive pressure. Less predatory pressure. Just to throw out some speculation to relieve the supposed impossibility.
But regardless, what you have is fallacious reasoning....
You shouldn't take belief B because of a lack of evidence for belief A. You should take belief B because of the reason for taking that belief.
Saying that spider web evolution seems too difficult, ergo spotaneous creation is bad reasoning. You should take spontaneous creation because of the evidence that suggests it happened. Which is?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by Buzsaw, posted 05-29-2008 8:06 PM Buzsaw has not replied

  
Fosdick 
Suspended Member (Idle past 5500 days)
Posts: 1793
From: Upper Slobovia
Joined: 12-11-2006


Message 42 of 53 (468570)
05-30-2008 11:32 AM
Reply to: Message 40 by Iblis
05-29-2008 8:25 PM


Re: Designer fixation and Darwinian selection
Iblis writes:
Sorry no, you clearly have me mistaken for someone who gives a shit. I have no cherished preconceived notions or fixed ideas that I would be willing to debate in a science class.
You don't? What about this from Message 1?
If we end up having enough spacetime in the thread I will work on introducing the Doctrine of the Trinity. That's right, into the science class!
And then you bring up a non-scientist with a Christian bent like C. S. Lewis:
I would go at it in a proper academic manner like C S Lewis does (imitating Aristotle and Machiavelli.)
The red ones just keep going up the flagpole.
Nope, I know exactly what is meant by selection, I know what figures of speech are. I've even specified random selection, I've harped on the whole random thing a lot and will continue to do so.
Do you really understand the "random thing"? Could you explain how selection is "random"? I can see how mutations are random, but not selection. Selection does not take a few fit ones here and a few unfit ones there. Selection takes the ones that nature can get to most easily. In this regard selection can be viewed as deterministic.
Now, I'll be waiting for you to assert that if selection is deterministic then it must be "intelligent."
I changed that to "is intelligence".
Then I suppose Earth "is intelligence," too, since it hosts humans.
...I would rather keep trying to clean up these raggedy shreds I'm getting from the Gaia hippies...
Why are you even bothering to clean up those raggedy shreds from the Gaia hippies? Who cares what they think?
Isn't there something in this story, about flatworms or planaria or some such germs, which were taught these simple maze tricks with the electrical shocks, and then they cut those germs up, and fed them to a different set of germs, and that new population then knew that maze without being taught?
From Wikipedia:
quote:
In 1955, Thompson and James V. McConnell conditioned planarian flatworms by pairing a bright light with an electric shock. After repeating this several times they took away the electric shock, and only exposed them to the bright light. The flatworms would react to the bright light as if they had been shocked. Thompson and McConnell found that if they cut the worm in two, and allowed both worms to regenerate each half would develop the light-shock reaction. In 1962, McConnell repeated the experiment, but instead of cutting the trained flatworms in two he ground them into small pieces and fed them to other flatworms. Incredibly these flatworms learned to associate the bright light with a shock much faster than flatworms who had not been fed trained worms.
This experiment intended to show that memory could perhaps be transferred chemically. The experiment was repeated with mice, fish, and rats, but it always failed to produce the same results, . The perceived explanation was that rather than memory being transferred to the other animals, it was the hormones in the ingested ground animals that changed its behaviour.[6] McConnell believed that this was evidence of a chemical basis for memory, which he identified as memory RNA. McConnell's results are now attributed to observer bias.[7] No double-blind experiment has ever reproduced his results.
This also brings into question whether or not memory is a good measure of "intelligence."
”HM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 40 by Iblis, posted 05-29-2008 8:25 PM Iblis has replied

Replies to this message:
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Iblis
Member (Idle past 3895 days)
Posts: 663
Joined: 11-17-2005


Message 43 of 53 (468625)
05-30-2008 7:51 PM
Reply to: Message 39 by Buzsaw
05-29-2008 8:06 PM


Attention Queen Dew Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Hi Buz, thanks for contributing.
Early writes:
spiders presumably didn't have as complex webs as they do now.
This is one of the reasons I go with ID sudden biological creation.
I don't believe I understand this statement though.
Note that I'm not complaining about you staking out gap positions and using them to illustrate your idea of "irreducible complexity", that's what some shoddy scientists and shady church elders have provided you with to use in this sort of debate and I will be happy to talk through it with you when it actually comes up. I even have some hope of providing you, in this thread, with some mathematics to quantify intelligence that will include division. The value of this is that it will give you a place to stick a zero and make "infinite intelligence" in the same way that the alleged T=0 "infinite density" idea is constructed. In the meantime look at my review of Lewis's pseudo-factual pop art above for hints at how to construct an argument that can evolve as it goes on, the way science does, without ever putting you in the position of disrespectfully testing your deity relationship thingie.
But no, I just don't understand why you chose this one. I have these bugs that make it inside sometimes, we call them "wood spiders" but I believe they are actually a variety of
Wolf spider - Wikipedia
Anyway they don't build complicated webs to trap their prey. It's not that they couldn't if they wanted to, they have the adhesive, they use it to stick eggs to their ass for example. They just don't. We could say "they don't know how" or we could say "they don't feel like it", but I don't know that we would be really you know, saying anything.
And they have relatives who use webs a bit more, and so on, there is a very high diversity among spider species in terms of engineering ability. So basically we have enough living species to build a perfectly feasible cladogram without postulating unrepresentable transitionals at all.
If I were going to do that I would take the information linked here
Spider taxonomy - Wikipedia
and scan through it quickly making note only of the web ability range, and take that data and put it through the process described here
Cladogram - Wikipedia
But honestly, this is a lot better, the people who made it cared a lot
Arthropoda
* Credit Wounded King in the please help me do my homework thread.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by Buzsaw, posted 05-29-2008 8:06 PM Buzsaw has replied

Replies to this message:
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Buzsaw
Inactive Member


Message 44 of 53 (468650)
05-30-2008 9:31 PM
Reply to: Message 43 by Iblis
05-30-2008 7:51 PM


Re: Survival Of Primitive Organisms
Thanks for the impressive info and links, Iblis. Logically, the more primitive you go back in the tree of life when living organisms were scarce the less these impressive complexities would factor for survival.

BUZSAW B 4 U 2 C Y BUZ SAW.
The immeasurable present eternally extends the infinite past and infinitely consumes the eternal future.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 43 by Iblis, posted 05-30-2008 7:51 PM Iblis has not replied

  
Iblis
Member (Idle past 3895 days)
Posts: 663
Joined: 11-17-2005


Message 45 of 53 (468663)
05-30-2008 10:54 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by Perdition
05-29-2008 12:05 AM


Re: Measuring higher intelligence
Perdition writes:
you seem to be talking to yourself for the most part, not many other participants, yet.
Yeah they are being cautious. If I'm wrong, it could be contagious. And if I'm right, and I keep going, odds are I'm going to get us crushed like bugs.
* Really they are waiting patiently for me to get my delicate house of cards all set up and then see who can demolish it with the least amount of effort.

This message is a reply to:
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