Ringer

That is unbelievably oversimplified. Mainly you will separate the brain into temporal, frontal, auditory, and occipital lobes. Within those will be many different parts. They are not necessarily input, output, and processor. And there are different types of neurons. Not to mention the glial cells.

Esbo, do you know what chlorophyll do? Do you know how much energy is needed for the chlorophyll to manipulate ADP into ATP, and are you certain that the addition of wavelengths being absorbed could cause this reaction to be processed more efficiently? If so would you show us how it would do so?

When was the last time you read these biology books? How are you at all sure they were talking about consciousness in the way you speak. Just saying it was a fairly large book that said biology on it doesn't mean anything. You still haven't given me a formal definition of consciousness so we can work out how it can be quantified, because it isn't as of now. A dictionary doesn't have formal definitions so don't link that again.

I've never seen a biology book say single celled organisms have a unit of consciousness; not saying yours doesn't but I would like to see the specific passage in context. My point was that there isn't a good scientific definition of consciousness. There isn't a quantitative way to measure consciousness because all we have is a loose concept. It is one of those things that people generally assume is something very specific, but can't define. Intelligence is an entirely different concept from consciousness, so IQ and things are not a measure of any sort of consciousness.

Define consciousness.

Actually you said "Does anyone believe that a human and an animal (not in human species) are the same?" and "The OP's "animal" means the animal not in human species, otherwise he asked a wrong question." So you are using a different definition of animals than is scientifically correct. As I said you are using a circular definition and is therefore not scientific. If you want to have a discussion of what makes us different from other animals you would have to be more precise. We are different from non-mammals in that we have hair and nurse our young. Where is your evidence they are not? Just because we have never personally been witness to something doesn't mean it is not possible. Where is the evidence for your conclusion that there is a line between humans and non-humans that is less arbitrary than the biological species concept?

Just seems like you may be over thinking it. Probability wise the probability of A plus the probability of not A is 1. So if there is a .25 probability there is a .75 probability of anything else.

You can't have a scientific discussion without using scientific definitions. Choosing your own definition took this out of scientific discussion. Scientifically humans are animals so there is no distinguishing factor. Your definition is circular, as I have said before, and is blatantly non-scientific. As is saying we are above other animals, although it wasn't you who said this, because we cannot have an unbiased view. How do we know that there are not animals studying us? Maybe they are doing observational studies right now and don't want to interfere with our natural interactions. If we wanted a purely scientific standpoint on what separates h. sapiens from other animals we would just give the biological species concept, which has its own problems. So the fact that we cannot mate and produce viable offspring is what separates us from other animals.

Oh yeah, no other creature has complex social arrangements. Well as long as we ignore birds, ants, termites, most primates, and millions of other animals. Your logic is only saying that humans are better because they are humans. That is circular logic, aka it doesn't work. How do you explain the forms of yeast that seem to have been multicellular and are now single celled? Also, if evolution goes the direction of complexity and we are at the top, why is it that if single celled organisms cease to exist most of life on Earth would go with it, including us. On the other hand if multicellular organisms died out suddenly most single celled organisms wouldn't be affected much at all. This is the last I will post on this because it is so far off-topic for this thread. If you want to continue start a new thread.

First paragraph of the first link has a glaring misunderstanding of evolutionary theory. If something does not affect reproductive success it has no reason to be selected against. If anything redundancy has evolutionary benefits because 1.) if a set of redundant gene is mutated whatever deficiency it may have created will be softened and the mutation itself could help reproductive success 2.) it allows systems to work even in the event that the first system my be functioning improperly due to injury. I am unsure of what he means about the speed of mutation. Since mutation is more or less random a redundancy could happen, in cross-over event for example, just as easily as a codon insertion/deletion.

Don't know who he is. What claims are you referring to?

I don't. I am under the impression that humans are, monophyletically, primates. Primates are part of kingdom animalia, so we are animals. If you are using some other usage of animal such as, "something that isn't human," your definition is circular. If you are somehow saying that humans are above other animals you are mistaken.

He meant that the sentence didn't make sense. Were you saying that everyone believes the line exists or that everyone knows where the line is? Both of these things are false, but maybe you meant something else. In which case, please elaborate.

You would have to ask the schools you wish to attend or your adviser for information like that. Many schools are different so I don't think anyone could make a generalization for all schools.

His responses to my and others simple explanations seemed, to me at least, to hint at a lack of understanding in all these areas. But he needs to understand photosynthesis in a simple manner. Then he can move on to things like cellular respiration and photosynthesis at a cellular level with an understanding of how stomata, chloroplasts, and the like interact. Then he can move on to an understanding of the molecular side of things such as ADP/ATP transformation, the Krebs cycle, and the like. Then he might have the knowledge to appreciate the quantum mechanics of the system.

These responses show that you do not have the prerequisite experience or knowledge to understand an explanation any more complex that chlorophyll don't absorb green light so they appear green. If you honestly can't understand the link String Junky posted or what I said you just need to read an introductory Botany book. You can probably pick one up at a used book store for fairly cheap.

Alright, how about we try this a different way than you saying everyone's answers are wrong. If you can show that autotrophs could produce a substantially significant amount of ATP using all frequencies of visible light instead variety of visible and non-visible light we can really start to have an effective conversation the way you seem to want. Then you can show us how that would give it an advantage in reproduction compared to the extra energy the pigment containing cells it would need to produce upon what has already evolved. You absorption argument is irrelevant, I could just as easily point out that predators only absorb around 1000th the energy available in its prey. Compared to autotrophs they are rubbish at efficiency. There is almost nothing evolution has made that is 100% efficient.

Even if you can poke holes in someone's explanation it doesn't mean you're right. Pretty much everyone here has given you an answer that is more or less true regardless of it you don't like it. Your 'picking apart' of my argument consisted of, "no, you're wrong because I'm right." That has pretty much been all your posts have been. If we wanted to be mean the first response would have been not all plants are green. The color green is not necessary for photosynthesis, it's just what most plants use. Your OP is based on a false pretense. Then we could go on to say that it doesn't matter what our eyes see, the plants don't care. Most of us have given you simplified explanations because none of us know how educated you are so we start of easy. None of us know how detailed you can, or want, to get into something. Do you want the molecular mechanisms involved in photosynthesis and information on why it uses certain wavelengths of light? Do you want to talk about the electron excitation of the molecules in the photosynthesizing molecules that give off certain wavelengths? Do you want to know how chlorophyll and cyanobacteria could evolve? If you want detailed explanations actually show us that you are educated in this area. It is none of our jobs to listen to you try to be condescending, we are here to try to help.

Because they aren't white. Their fur is fairly translucent and thus gives a slight reflection of their surroundings. Would you like to try again? My answer doesn't have a flaw. You knowing an answer doesn't cause another answer to have a flaw. Especially since you are apparently trying annoy people by telling them their answers have non-existent flaws by moving goal posts. You're OP asked, "wouldn't black be better?" It may be that black would be better, but that doesn't matter in the context of evolution. You moving the goal posts doesn't make me wrong.

When animals evolve they don't do what's best, they do what works. To ask why something evolved the way it did is useless. The only reason you can give is that something evolved the ability to absorb light at certain frequencies and that is all they needed to win the genetic lottery. Then other species happened to absorb that other species and they evolved together like mitochondria before them. It works, whether or not there is an alternative didn't matter.

I thought Ecclestone started off kind of slow and then left when he really started to get the feel of the character. I just wish I got the show where I live and didn't have to try to find it on Netflix or on the internet and could actually watch it on TV.

I think Tennant did a great job. The doctor now not so much, but it's still pretty good.

Firefly is pretty awesome. ajb, I'm suprised you didn't mention Dr. Who since your picture is one of the doctors.

I wouldn't think it would be a problem.

I plan to go into a similar program so this is pretty much just what my advisors have told me, I'm a double major so I have 2. For a neurobiology program you probably want some experience in molecular and cellular biology because that is where much of the research is going on in the pure biological side. Also try to get the lab time in for both of those as well. Genetics is another that is looked upon favorably. I assume you did some physiological psych and behavioral neuro, which is pretty much the same class, so those will obviously be handy. You could also do computational neuro which is supposed to be pretty interesting, but fairly math intensive if you enjoy that. Cognitive neuro is also a pretty interesting field that is less intensive on the biological aspects and focuses more on the psychological underpinnings. As I said, I'm still in undergrad so this is pretty much what I've been told.