CharonY

This does not sound like a swing, but more like a ratchet.

Which would limit your definition of intelligence pretty much to animals (though there might be uncertainty where the precise cut-off might be). "Intellectual process" while still being vague, suggests higher order reasoning not exhibited by all living organisms. Many adaptations provide near-optimal outcomes without intellectual processes. It is unclear why you invoke complexity in this respect. Simple self-reinforcing networks can find optimized solutions without higher intellectual effort and it does so by reducing complexity (i.e. reducing all possible solutions possible by allowing all activities to pruning down to limited activity and hence, a less complex network). The rest is just invoking another circular argument (if it does not have mind it is not intelligent. And something is intelligent because it has a mind). The only breakthrough I can see is a closer definition of the "intellectual process" but that is being again too vague to be applied to biological processes.

You are equating the production and release of a molecule that can be used as a signal with systems that are able of higher level of reasoning. It is like saying a round stone is pretty much the same functionally as a racing car because both can move under the right conditions. Even worse, the same could be true for any feedback system. Precipitation is now an intelligent system, as it clearly integrates factors such as humidity, evaporation, temperature, air movement and so on in order to result in a non-random likelihood of rain.

Still, it is weird how different the bar is set for Biden vs Trump. When the latter was elected, I have wondered whether the competence of the President actually matters to keep the country running. Empirically it seems that it doesn't unless there are emergency situations for which there are no clear mechanisms (say, a pandemic). And again, the evidence suggests that Trump failed miserably in that aspect. Policywise Biden's administration managed to transition the US mostly safe out of the pandemic (especially economics-wise), something that would be rather unlikely under Trump. Also, it is pretty clear that in contrast to the first presidency, Trump would pack his administration with loyalists rather than incorporate competent folks. Unless you spend your presidency playing golf and watching Fox news.

As mentioned,that definition is so broad that is is basically meaningless, as outlined early in the discussion. The reasoning is entirely circular. Everything has intelligence, intelligence is the substrate of mind, everything has a mind. As INow implied, that suggests no difference between a single cell (and arguably also even simpler elements, such as viruses, mobile genetic elements and so on), multicellular organisms, trees, animals, bacteria and so on. This is basically a distinction that makes no difference and does not hold any information as consequence. Also, these assumptions appear to be based on a series of misconceptions regarding biological concepts which further muddies the waters.

Yes the timeline is way in the past- predating human activities and includes switches between ice ages and interglacial periods which were initiated by factors other than CO2. Note that coming out of an ice age, the increase in temperature can also increase CO2 production by e.g. stimulating biological activity. This can result in a feedback that further increases CO2. Note that after the initial lag, CO2 and temp tend to rise together. However, you will also note that the timeline is not really great to see the current impact of CO2 on temperature.

To be fair, the voters themselves are doing quite a bit of heavy lifting here.

Yes, but is that really low, around that time in their first term Obama was at an approval rating of around 47 and George W Bush 46. It does not seem that given all that is going on the ratings are really abysmal for Trump. Compared to, say, Jimmy Carter.

Indeed, in many ways SCOTUS positions itself as the kingmaker, defining what can and what cannot be done. I may be overthinking this, but some of the arguments I have read are so convoluted, they remind me of how priests interpret scripture. I.e. with an outcome in mind then work backwards to justify it using interpretation of the holy script.

I think folks really meant cheques and account balances. A nice vacation here, some hush money there.

The case is not compelling, just based on an assumption. If you define intelligence as broadly as you have with mind, there is really nothing to test the claim against. In fact, you have pretty much argued that there is nothing without intelligence, which then makes it a circular argument. There is no spreading if everything has it. As others have stated: nope.

I am not entirely sure what you mean. With all things considered either his popularity is good enough to get into a dead heat despite all the disqualifying scandals or his base is large enough that it would not matter.

Quite frequently authoritarians are depicted as highly intelligent schemers who somehow seduce the public to give them all the power. Meanwhile, we see how a reality show celebrity stumbles its way to dictatorship while pretty much messing up everything he could on the way. Yet he still gets it handed to him (talking about privilege). Can we cancel reality? After all folks are talking about cancel culture all the time, aren't they?

Hard to tell, as norms are out of the window. I doubt that anyone has enough insights to accurately predict, well, anything at this point. We are so deep in unexplored territory, we should give it a proper name at this point. And I have the weird feeling that things are only going to accelerate.

We really are not unless you do selective comparisons. It is more radiation in all directions (and see what sticks). Nope, especially not on this board that I remember. But intelligence does come at a cost. You have proposed two things (implicitly) a) evolution goes towards higher complexity, which would also include brains with higher intelligence, and b) intelligence provides massive advantages in evolutionary contexts. From there it should follow that over time organisms would be increasingly complex and intelligent. A simple look at current biodiversity clearly indicates that this is not the case. There is one species that managed to get enormous advantages from intelligence, but it is clearly not widely distributed and is therefore not a trend. Or have anything that works for your environment. That can include being smaller, or slower and have smaller brain (thus requiring less energy and nutrients). Fitness is not determined by strength.

At this point I would argue that it not only works but has proven to be the most effective means of manipulating public opinion. The mythical link between immigration (or anything alien) and crime is extremely enduring throughout modern human history, for example. It just works and the only thing you need is that people feel some sort of economic crisis (bonus points if they are real, but they don't even have to be).

Also nope. Sometimes the solution is to go simpler to avoid detection, for example. Or introduce a bit of randomness (e.g. simple point mutations). The mechanisms we see for example to avoid antibiotic resistance is not getting more complicated. Most extreme resistant organisms simply use exporters that pump the drug away from them. They generally do not have huge complicated mechanisms, as there is selective pressure for them to remain efficient. As before, new developments (e.g. an entirely new defence system) can lead to some other developments. Or it can lead to loss of existing functions. Many pathogens (i.e. those specialized in infecting other organisms) have very small genomes and while they may have specialized pathogenicity factors, they often lose other bits and pieces (e.g. traits needed for environmental survival). The way you describe it seems that you think organisms keep accumulating traits of increasing complexity. That is clearly not the case. Edit: it occurs to me that this discussion is getting really far away from the original topic and is more about misconceptions in evolution (and to some degree, biological/ biochemical processes in general).

Yeah, we truly are stuck in the stupid timeline.

Look, it is simple. The presidents cannot do these things, if they wants to stay within confines of laws and accepted norms, as the founders did not explicitly tell them that they could. However, there are no repercussions if they decide to act unlawful and say, force vaccinate folks and shoot people who pollute the environment. The distinction is very important because of reasons. Also, it is great that no candidate would ever even have a shot at the presidency if they openly proclaim that they want leverage the presidency to exact vengeance and end democracy, right? I mean, that would just be too ridiculous to even consider.

The question shows that you are not thinking correctly about the the mechanism. Neuroplasticity is fundamentally related to activity, which in turns can reorganize the brain on multiple levels. I have no idea why that is supposed to be something groundbreaking, it is something we have known for a long time. Other tissues can also do quite a bit of reorganization, following a wide of cues related e.g. to injury, inflammation or all sorts of signals. I have, therefore no idea what difference these tidbit really are supposed to make. The simple organisms still exist. There is no push in a specific direction. The way to think about it, is that certain more complex organisms can occupy niches that were previously inaccessible. But then, they become niches themselves, too and then get colonized by new, but simpler organisms. But the fundamental process on Earth are still driven by the simpler ones. To wit, if all complex organisms disappeared from Earth, there would be still life on it. But if all the simple organisms disappeared, life would eventually cease.

The ramifications are pretty bad and not only for the Jan 6 lawsuits. From Sottomayor's dissent: So for all intents and purpose it seems that the US has now executed a critical blow against functioning democracy. As step, no doubt, other countries will look at very carefully (and probably promptly find ways to emulate).

Based on your logic, countries with regular famines should have expanded beyond our solar system by now.

Dilly argument. What is the carrying capacity of Mars?

1 No some, such as chemical mutations are mostly random. Others, such as splicing are not. Some, such as recombination are slightly random, but follow somewhat predictable patterns. 3 solving a major challenge in a given scientific area usually sweeps through the community rapidly. After all, many many folks are working on it and the moment someone finds the smoking gun, everyone will know.

Yes of course they would. While splicing refers to RNA modification, it does not change ones genes. However, the mechanisms for splicing are inherited. Likewise, there are mechanisms that can change the genomic content, via e.g. recombination. You are talking about two things. One is summarizing (accurately) existing literature and the second is putting a spin on them to make their argument. The tricky bit is spotting where they are still sticking to lit and where they start their spin. It is fairly often that woo doctors start off with a reasonable interpretation of a finding and then somehow convince that doing just X will magically improve health, without actually having data to support that. I am, for example, skeptical that the literature he summarizes actually make a link between thoughts and recept subunit diversity. Relating molecular structures to something seemingly simple as cellular physiology is a challenge already. And then making the step towards higher-level functions is an almost insurmountable jump from the bottom up. If there was a basis for that, the work would be published in high-ranked papers, not on a random website. I will also add that based on the article the author is not taking a metaphysical stance. Quite to the contrary, he argumes mostly from a brain perspective- just being more certain about how it relates to thoughts than the evidence allows.