Mind

[CharonY]

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.

 

[Luc Turpin]

2 hours ago, dimreepr said:

What's that got to do with intelligence?

Yup meant that I agreed with your statement. However, some believe that viruses are alive.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1369848616300085

The premise states that intelligence is all over nature; meaning those that are alive as opposed to those that are not.

For clarity, maybe I should have said "all over the living natural world" or something to that effect.

2 hours ago, Phi for All said:

So sorry for all those unintelligent plants and organisms that just lost their "live" status. It breaks the heart!

Did I imply that plants and organisms were not alive? That is certainly not my contention.  Viruses are not made out of cells, plants and organisms are. I contend that virures are not alive, but some say they are (see above). And for assurance purposes, plants and organisms are indeed alive. As for intelligence, I would refer you back to one of my posts on plant intelligence.

2 hours ago, swansont said:

And then you spoke of randomness being affected by “mind” and how “mind” is the source of complexity in nature.

I actually said that mind affects randomness, not the opposite. As for mind being a source of complexity in nature, CharonY and iNow have compelling arguments that evolution does not favour any direction, including increasing complexity. 

[Phi for All]

1 minute ago, Luc Turpin said:

Did I imply that plants and organisms were not alive? That is certainly not my contention.

You mad the claim that intelligence "may be the defining line between non-living and living". I took that to mean... well, what you wrote:

 

3 hours ago, Luc Turpin said:

Yup! May be the defining line between non-living and living.

[Luc Turpin]

18 minutes ago, Phi for All said:

You mad the claim that intelligence "may be the defining line between non-living and living". I took that to mean... well, what you wrote:

 

No, no, meant that "viruses" were at the border of those being alive and those not alive. As mentioned, the debate rages on as to whether viruses are alive or not. Should have been clearer.

However, is it possible that intelligence is associated with life while unintelligence with lifelessness?

1 hour ago, CharonY said:

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.

 

1 - The capacity to communicate, solve problems, make decisions. Plants appear to do some of this while rocks don't. Single cells are intelligent, but to a lesser degree than us. Proto-intelligence versus advanced intelligence I guess.

Plants

Research shows dramatic abilities of decision-making, complex communication including communication at great distance through fungal wires, and for self-defense. A plant is able to plan ahead to the time of the morning dew, to make a toxic chemical that will kill mildew at that moment. Any sooner or later they could kill themselves with the toxin.

Microbes

Microbes exhibit many “brainlike” capacities without a brain. They show decision-making from multiple inputs, group behavior, and advanced communication. Microbes can self-edit/mutate their genes to make special proteins to combat viruses, other microbes, and plants. These are complex large proteins that depend upon their exact shape. With the most advanced supercomputers, humans cannot calculate the folding of an average sized protein, from the codes. Yet microbes appear to know.

Cells

Neurons, immune cells, and cancer cells, which are vastly more complex than microbes, demonstrate extremely advanced communication and group activity.

2- I don't know what to make of this one!

[swansont]

29 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

I actually said that mind affects randomness, not the opposite.

I said randomness affected by mind, which is functionally the same thing, not the opposite.

29 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

As for mind being a source of complexity in nature, CharonY and iNow have compelling arguments that evolution does not favour any direction, including increasing complexity. 

I’m not seeing the connection.

[Luc Turpin]

59 minutes ago, swansont said:

I said randomness affected by mind, which is functionally the same thing, not the opposite.

I’m not seeing the connection.

You are correcct, not the opposite. Mind or more specifically, intelligence which is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decisions, should reduce randomness (replacing chance by some sort of reasoning) while fluctuating between more or less complexity depending on preferential outcome.

Mind reducing randomness and fluctuating complexity on the evolution of the living that is.

[Phi for All]

2 hours ago, Luc Turpin said:

No, no, meant that "viruses" were at the border of those being alive and those not alive.

But you said that intelligence might be the defining line between living and non-living. Then you double-down right afterwards:

2 hours ago, Luc Turpin said:

However, is it possible that intelligence is associated with life while unintelligence with lifelessness?

As others have said, if you're claiming that plants have intelligence, you've broadened the definition so far that it's now useless. No definition of life I've come across would exclude plants, and no definition of intelligence would include them. 

I have noted before that life is generally better at absorbing and dissipating energy from the sun than inorganic matter is. That's mostly due to movement, not whether they have a brain or mind.

 

[CharonY]

15 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

You are correcct, not the opposite. Mind or more specifically, intelligence which is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decisions, should reduce randomness (replacing chance by some sort of reasoning) while fluctuating between more or less complexity depending on preferential outcome.

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.

[Luc Turpin]

1 hour ago, Luc Turpin said:

You are correcct, not the opposite. Mind or more specifically, intelligence which is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decisions, should reduce randomness (replacing chance by some sort of reasoning) while fluctuating between more or less complexity depending on preferential outcome.

Mind reducing randomness and fluctuating complexity on the evolution of the living that is.

Let me rephrase this. Mind should reduce randomness by replacing chance with some sort of an intellectual process in finding the optimal course of action for the preferred outcome. It should also allow for the modulation of complexity in order again of finding the optimal course of action for the preferred outcome. Sometimes the best course of action would a simple solution while at other times it would be a complex solution to the problem at hand.

1 hour ago, Phi for All said:

But you said that intelligence might be the defining line between living and non-living. Then you double-down right afterwards:

As others have said, if you're claiming that plants have intelligence, you've broadened the definition so far that it's now useless. No definition of life I've come across would exclude plants, and no definition of intelligence would include them. 

I have noted before that life is generally better at absorbing and dissipating energy from the sun than inorganic matter is. That's mostly due to movement, not whether they have a brain or mind.

 

1- I am asking the question; not sure of the answer. And why would intelligence being the defining line between living and non-living would put into question plants as living entities?

2- Right from the begining I stated that mind was all over nature. Intelligence is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decision. If it does not do that, then it is not intelligent.

3- Good point, but why do they move towards the sun, by chance or some sort of intention?

46 minutes ago, CharonY said:

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.

1- If the production and release of a molecule is being controlled then it could be mind if it is just the release at the proper temperature then it is chance. I agree with you that differentiating between functionality and possible intent is hard to do.

2- Just a feedback loop on its own is not mind. A feedback loop under some sort of control could be mind. Again, the difference would be hard to make, but I think that the information that I provided earlier seems to point in one direction rather than another.  All circuits being orchestrated almost instantaneously is not chance, its communication; one of the tell tale sign of intelligence.

[Phi for All]

27 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

2- Right from the begining I stated that mind was all over nature. Intelligence is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decision. If it does not do that, then it is not intelligent.

My apologies, I thought others had persuaded you that your definitions were non-standard and ill-conceived.

[CharonY]

22 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

Let me rephrase this. Mind should reduce randomness by replacing chance with some sort of an intellectual process in finding the optimal course of action for the preferred outcome. It should also allow for the modulation of complexity in order again of finding the optimal course of action for the preferred outcome. Sometimes the best course of action would a simple solution while at other times it would be a complex solution to the problem at hand.

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. 

[swansont]

1 hour ago, Luc Turpin said:

You are correcct, not the opposite. Mind or more specifically, intelligence which is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decisions, should reduce randomness (replacing chance by some sort of reasoning) while fluctuating between more or less complexity depending on preferential outcome.

Mind reducing randomness and fluctuating complexity on the evolution of the living that is.

I fail to see how intelligence would reduce randomness, though you don’t specify what randomness you’re talking about. If I flip a fair coin, the odds of heads or tails is 1/2. My intelligence has no effect on that. 

So perhaps you can clarify what you mean, instead of appealing to these vague notions.

[Luc Turpin]

51 minutes ago, Phi for All said:

My apologies, I thought others had persuaded you that your definitions were non-standard and ill-conceived.

Non-standard yes; ill-conceived, working on it.

48 minutes ago, CharonY said:

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. 

According to the information that I provided, it would connect plants, microbes and cells to a limited form of intelligence. Intellectual process (communicating, problem solving, decision making). Many adaptations provide near-optimal outcomes without intellectual processes - yes, but not all of them. I thought that left to chance, organisms would go through all possible options randomly and by chance fall on the ones that work, so those organisms surviveswhile all not having the successful survival mechanism would succomb due to mal-adaptivity. As for complexity, I am not so sure anymore that it would be an indicator of mind having an effect on the evolution of organisms. This change was brought about by convincing arguments from you and iNow.

1 hour ago, swansont said:

I fail to see how intelligence would reduce randomness, though you don’t specify what randomness you’re talking about. If I flip a fair coin, the odds of heads or tails is 1/2. My intelligence has no effect on that. 

So perhaps you can clarify what you mean, instead of appealing to these vague notions.

Let me think about this one. I will get back to you with something that hopefully does not appeal to vague notions.

 

[Luc Turpin]

Randomness

Mind, the usual kind or my kind, increases the probability of survival and reproduction. It does so by injecting intelligence (capacity to communicate, solve problems and decision making) into the process of natural selection. Being cunning in avoiding predators, developing strategies for finding food increases one’s chances of surviving. Also being crafty in attracting a mate also increases one’s chances of passing on genes to the next generation.

Complexity and mind in Nature

This summarizes all that I have been saying so far on this thread. The list of those contemplating mind as having a role in nature is getting longer. I do not feel any longer that I am the only fool crying wolf. The text is long, but a very worthwhile read. If too long for your taste, then read excerpts of it. Mounting evidence may very well one day contribute to a fundamental paradigm shift in science. Do I hear a ruffle or thunder in the forest?

“In the words of philosopher Evan Thompson, “a living being is not sheer exteriority . . . but instead embodies a kind of interiority, that of its own immanent purposiveness” (2007, p. 225), and it is recently being realized that this may apply to plants as well as animals and to the unicellular as well as the multicellular. The more we learn about life, its amazing complexity and its fundamental commonality as it extends over time and space, the more it becomes clear that there must be some kind of ‘mind,’ some purposive inwardness that pushes ahead, pursuing its own life in its own way, within each living organism, ‘all the way down.’”

“Microbial life, being life, by definition is of such organized complexity that we should not be surprised to find perception, motility, and evidence of subtle responsiveness to environmental conditions even in the single-celled. The green alga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, for example, has an eyespot composed of rhodopsin photoreceptors that, when stimulated, release a current of calcium ions that modify its flagellar motion, orienting it toward or away from light (Kateriya et al., 2004); the slime mold Physarum polycephalum, moreover, has been described as showing ‘primitive intelligence’ by solving a maze, finding the minimum length solution joining two nutrient locations at different ends of an agar labyrinth (Nakagaki et al., 2000). Plants, too, are exquisitely sensitive to factors such as light, moisture and nutrients, as well as predators and pollinators in their environment, and they respond to them in ways that further their growth and propagation; they also communicate with fellow plants, of the same and other species, within their ecological communities. Since plants are sessile (rooted to one place), their behavioral repertoire is necessarily more limited in terms of movement, but they exhibit many sophisticated responses that can rewardingly be studied along the lines of animal behavior, including anticipation of future events, memory, and communication with other organisms (Karban, 2008). They respond individually to the heterogeneity of light and moisture in their environment throughout their growth, not only by placing root and leaf development in the most favorable circumstances, but in ways that have been described as showing ‘choice’; the parasitic dodder plant, for example, actively rejects potential host plants of inferior nutrition by turning its shoot growth at right angles from such stems and elongating directly away from them (Kelly, 1992).”

“It has long been noted that plants respond to leaf-devouring insect attacks by releasing volatile chemicals, a response that not only leads other plants to beef up their own leaf level of insect-repellents but that sometimes draws in specific insect predators and parasitizing wasps (Pare & Tumlinson, 1999). The timing and intensity of release can vary in accordance with a multiplicity of environmental factors, and blends of different odor-producing volatiles can be produced in response to different leaf-eaters, possibly summoning particular carnivorous insects specialized to feast on each kind of herbivore, making it a highly sophisticated response that has been considered, according to a ‘behavioural ecological approach’ that speaks in terms of plant ‘decisions,’ and a ‘crying for help’ within the larger ecological community (Dicke, 2009). It has also been known for several decades now that many forest trees are linked together in underground networks by the mycorrhizal fungi associated with their roots, and they have been shown to send each other nutrients, communicate warning signals, and recognize kin through these networks. According to Suzanne Simard, another scientist who does not hesitate to draw a parallel with the behavior of animals, “the topology of mycorrhizal networks is similar to neural networks, with scale-free patterns and small-world properties that are correlated with local and global efficiencies important in intelligence” (Simard, 2018, p. 191). ^[4] The communicative properties of trees have also been conveyed to the public by Peter Wohlleben, a German forester, in The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate (2016); he speaks of the ‘wood-wide-web’ that connects the trees in a forest, noting that the ‘mother trees,’ the big, old trees that serve as hubs, ‘suckle their young,’ pumping sugars through the network into the roots of young saplings too shaded to survive on their own (Grant, 2018).”

“The similarities between plant and animal behavior and, in some respects, their physiology prompted a group of scientists to announce in 2006 the founding of a new subspecialty, ‘plant neurobiology,’ maintaining that ‘the behavior plants exhibit is coordinated across the whole organism by some form of integrated signaling, communication, and response system,’ one that ‘includes long-distance electrical signals, vesicle-mediated transport of auxin in specialized vascular tissues, and production of chemicals known to be neuronal in animals’ (Brenner et al., 2006). The announcement was met with outrage from a certain quarter of the plant science community, more than thirty luminaries signing onto a letter noting that “there is no evidence for structures such as neurons, synapses or a brain in plants” (although the ‘plant neurobiologists’ had made no such claims) and challenging the proponents of the new field “to reevaluate critically the concept and to develop an intellectually rigorous foundation for it” (Alpi et al., 2007, p. 136). One of the signatories, Lincoln Taiz, interviewed by Michael Pollan, speaks dismissively of ‘a strain of teleology in plant biology’ and strenuously rejects the notion of ‘choice’ or ‘decision-making’ in plants, explaining that “the plant response is based entirely on the net flow of auxin and other chemical signals,” and maintaining that the verb ‘decide’ is a term that “implies free will.” He amends his stance, however, with the caveat “of course, one could argue that humans lack free will too, but that is a separate issue” (Pollan, 2013). This last statement is rather telling—when one is coming from a reductionist position that flattens down the purposiveness of all life into the bumping about of chemical compounds- one must be sure to keep that belief system ‘separate’ from our understanding of how we actually live our own lives. Whereas, accepting the evolutionary continuity that exists among lifeforms seen as whole organisms lets us recognize the purposiveness, intentional behavior and intelligence that exists throughout living nature—in us and in everything else that’s alive- with no need to make a special exception for ourselves. Pollan observes that “our big brains, and perhaps our experience of inwardness, allow us to feel that we must be fundamentally different—suspended above nature and other species as if by some metaphysical ‘skyhook,’ to borrow a phrase from philosopher Daniel Dennett.” But he notes that “plant neurobiologists are intent on taking away our skyhook, completing the revolution that Darwin started but which remains—psychologically at least—incomplete” (Pollan, 2013, n.p.).

Monica Gagliano is another scientist who has already made the paradigm shift; unapologetic about speaking of learning, memory, and intelligence in plants (Gagliano et al., 2016). She is at the same time, critical of “those who make the big claims and write grand opinion pieces,” saying “we don’t need another opinion piece”—“we need to do the science.” Having started as an animal ecologist, she prefers to call her field ‘plant cognitive ethology,’ maintaining that, “for me, a plant isn’t an object, it’s always a subject that is interacting with other subjects in the environment” (Morris, 2018, n.p.). ^[5] Unlike plants, however, animals typically move rapidly around in their environments and so must have a way of coordinating their movements rapidly—hence the emergence of the nervous system. Simple animals like sponges rely on cell-to-cell signaling, and radially symmetric animals like jellyfish make do with diffuse nerve nets, but the bilaterians generally coordinate their movements via well-developed nervous systems that are believed to have originated in a last common ancestor arising over 500 million years ago. The basic structure is a linear nerve cord with ‘ganglion’ enlargements supplying each body segment, and a larger ‘brain’ at the front end; in invertebrates, including many worms, crustaceans, and insects, the nerve cord is divided in two and placed ventrally, below the major organs of the body, while in vertebrates it is dorsally located and encased in a bony vertebral column. The insect brain is made up of three regions, the protocerebrum, deuterocerebrum, and tritocerebrum. The largest region is the protocerebrum that houses the mushroom bodies, paired neuron clusters making up the ‘higher’ brain centers, thought to be important in learning, memory, and behavioral complexity, especially in bees, wasps and ants; it is estimated that the mushroom bodies contain about 340,000 neurons in the honeybee. An example of complex cognitive behavior in insects is the ‘waggle dance’ of honeybees, which communicates information to hive mates about the direction and distance to sources of nectar and pollen. ^[6] Faced with the striking degree of organizational similarity among living animal forms, one scientist recently summarized, “as our knowledge of neural development increases, so does the list of conserved features, pointing to the existence of a highly sophisticated, single species as the origin of most extant nervous systems” (Ghysen, 2003, p. 555). The vast majority of animal forms utilize the sensory information they take in from their environment in order to move in appropriate, survival-related ways. Hence they will have a great variety of perceptual abilities, forms of cognitive processing, and behavioral responses shaped by the different ecological niches they inhabit, something that we tend to take for granted but should recognize as a distinctive feature of animal life that extends far beyond the boundaries of our own species. Development of the human brain follows the same basic trajectory as that of all mammalian brains, the neural tube expanding into hindbrain, midbrain and forebrain regions, with the latter giving rise to an expanded cerebral cortex. Some other mammals also manifest a high degree of cortical development, including the other great apes, elephants, and cetaceans such as the bottle-nosed dolphin. To put our own brain power in perspective, we will look at what we now know about the brains of some other animals, bearing in mind that we are learning more all the time as careful investigations are carried out utilizing new technologies and with an open-minded attitude to what we may find.”

“The brain of the false killer whale, at almost 4,000 g, is more than twice the size of the human brain, at roughly 1,500 g, while the brain of the African elephant is almost three times larger, at four to 5,000 g, and the brain of the sperm whale, the largest of the mammals, is almost six times larger, at around 8,000 g. The cortical surfaces of the brains of the two cetaceans are also more highly convoluted, cetaceans showing the greatest degree of convolution among the mammals. Earlier comparisons have focused on the ratio of brain to body size, the ‘encephalization quotient,’ but this appears a rather crude measurement in light of a newly developed technology allowing for a quantitative assessment of the number of neurons and non-neuronal cells in different regions of the brain and in total, opening up insights into a greater degree of diversity in brain architecture than heretofore appreciated (Herculano-Houzel, 2009). Using this technology, it has been discovered that the different orders of mammals have different ‘cellular scaling rules’ determining the density of neurons present per gram of brain tissue. Larger brains in rodents, for example, will contain larger total numbers of neurons than will smaller rodent brains, but the brains of primates ‘scale in a much more space-saving, economical manner,’ such that neuron density is greater, and so increasing brain size in primates results in an even greater number of neurons, gram for gram, than would be found in rodents. By this measure, humans, with the largest brains among the primates, do have the greatest number of brain cells—in a 1.5 kg brain, 86 billion neurons and 85 billion non-neuronal cells have been found—but only when compared with the other, smaller-brained primates. ^[7] According to the author of these studies, “we need to rethink our notions about the place that the human brain holds in nature and evolution, and rewrite some of the basic concepts that are taught in textbooks” (Herculano-Houzel, 2009, pp. 9-10). Ours is not qualitatively different from other primate brains, but simply has the number of neurons expected for its size; it is basically just ‘a linearly scaled-up primate brain.’ Moreover, our cerebral cortex, which makes up 82% of our brain mass at an average of 1,233 g (out of an average 1,500 g brain), holds only 16 billion neurons (19% of the total in the brain), a fraction similar to that seen in other primates and some other mammals. While the cerebellum—a part of the brain until recently considered solely devoted to movement coordination, but now becoming the focus of increasing interest as its complex interconnections with the cerebral cortex are explored—weighs only 154 g but contains 69 billion neurons (Herculano-Houzel, 2009). The new research not only gives us a new perspective on our own brains, and thereby our ‘cognitive’ place in nature, it is beginning to change our views of other animals, what they are really like and what they might be capable of, cognitively. The brain of the African elephant is not only roughly three times larger than our own, it contains roughly three times as many neurons—257 billion of them as calculated in the pioneering study (Herculano-Houzel, 2014). The vast majority of them, however—251 billion, or 97.5%—are found in the cerebellum, with only 5.6 billion in the cerebral cortex—and the neurons that are found there are thought to be an average of 10 to 40 times larger than those found in other mammals, with what this might mean for cognition being currently unknown. The size of the elephant cerebellum, which makes up more than 25% of the total brain mass, the largest proportionally of all mammals, has been speculated to be related to infrasound communication or possibly to processing the complex sensory and motor requirements involved in the sensitive, manipulatory use of the trunk—but much remains to be discovered about this fascinating animal.”

“The numbers and distributions of neurons in the brains of cetaceans are yet to be determined—one estimate was 11 billion neurons in the cerebral cortex of the false killer whale, but this could be off by a factor of ten, giving an estimate of between 21 billion and 212 billion for the whole brain, depending on the scaling rules for the order, as yet undetermined (Herculano-Houzel, 2009). One thing that is known is that the architecture of cetacean brains is even more divergent from the typical mammalian plan than that of elephants. While their brains are the most highly convoluted among the mammals, their cerebral cortex is comparatively thin and appears to lack one of the usual six layers of cells. Moreover, instead of an expansion of the frontal lobes, as observed in primates, there has been an expansion toward the sides, in the temporal and parietal regions, and there is a completely new lobe, the paralimbic lobe, not found in any other mammal, the function of which is so far unknown (Marino, 2002) but possibly may be related to echolocation or coordination of synchronous movements in groups of animals. The pattern of projection of visual and auditory information onto the cerebral cortex is also highly unusual among mammals, as is the marked degree of independence between the two cerebral hemispheres, which reportedly sleep independently of one another, and seem to be altogether lacking in REM sleep.”

“The brains of birds, too, have recently been found to be more remarkable than once believed. Birds have a pallium instead of the neocortex found in mammals; the surface of their brains is smooth rather than convoluted, and the cells in their cerebrum are arranged in nuclear clusters instead of layers. It has recently been discovered, however, that their neurons are even more tightly packed than in the brains of primates, with parrots and songbirds having about twice as many neurons as primate brains of the same mass, and their brains are truly ‘miniaturized,’ since the short distance between neurons necessitated by their high densities likely results in a higher speed of information processing (Olkowicz et al., 2016). Parrots, like primates, show an increased connectivity between the telencephalon and the cerebellum, possibly indicative of an interplay between fine motor skills and complex cognition in birds (Gutierrez-Ibanez et al., 2018), along the lines of what is being investigated in mammals. What is being learned about the brains of birds, moreover, is spurring a new look at the brains of reptiles and even fish. The mobulid rays, a group of cartilaginous fishes comprising the manta and devil rays, have high encephalization quotients, a relatively large telencephalon making up over 60% of the brain mass, and a high degree of cerebellar foliation thought to be due to their active, maneuverable lifestyles and highly developed social and migratory behavior (Ari, 2011). A study of selected genes from mammalian neocortex and homologous genes from avian and turtle brains found, once again, a ‘highly conserved’ pattern of gene expression, supporting the conclusion that many of the cell types, neurotransmitters, and circuitry are widely shared among the vertebrates, preserving the major connections and performing very similar functions despite major differences in brain structure and tissue architecture, attesting to fundamental continuity since the last common ancestor, over 500 million years ago.”

“Among the ‘brainier’ members of the mammalian and avian classes—particularly the primates, elephants, whales and dolphins, parrots, corvids and some other songbirds, and even the mobulid rays (Ari & D’Agostino, 2016)—we are finding many, many examples of ‘higher cognition.’ Over the last five to 10 years or so, there has been a veritable explosion of research reports, popular articles and books detailing what’s being discovered about their abilities, and it is now widely accepted that some of these animals engage in tool use, mirror self-recognition, imitation, vocal learning, and complex social cognition likely including ‘theory of mind,’ to name a few indicators. Frans deWaal discusses the cognitive abilities of some of these other animals, from apes and monkeys to crows and parrots, elephants and octopuses, and even ants, wasps and bees, raising deep questions about our common assumption: that humans are the only living beings capable of intelligent thought (and that only the human kind of thought should be considered ‘intelligent’), an attitude that, because it is exclusively ‘centered upon the human,’ is termed anthropocentrism. ^[8]”

“One way to see how our thinking has changed can be illustrated by consideration of what we have been learning about birds, both in terms of behavior and in brain structure. As discussed by Ackerman (2016), birds have now been extensively documented to have complex cognitive abilities, including memory and spatial mapping (Clark’s nutcrackers can bury and retrieve pine seeds from up to 5,000 caches spread over hundreds of square miles), tool use (New Caledonian crows fashion elaborate tools from branches and bend wires into hooks for obtaining food), vocal learning (mockingbirds can imitate, with near perfection, as many as two hundred different songs of other birds), social learning (a few great tits learned to open milk bottles in a single town in the 1920s and the behavior spread widely over Britain over subsequent decades; crows can recognize individual humans and spread information about the ‘dangerous’ scientists who capture them across large social networks), mirror self-recognition (Eurasian magpies will scratch away a mark put on their throat when seen in a mirror), and complex social interaction, manipulation, and possibly ‘theory of mind’ (western scrub jays keep track of other birds that might be watching them when they cache their food, and will recache it later if necessary; male Eurasian jays seem to understand their mates’ specific desires for certain foods). But until recently, little effort was put into making such observations, since until very recently we had little respect for ‘bird brains.’”

“The lines giving rise to the primates, elephants, and cetaceans probably diverged over 95 million years ago, with independent evolution occurring in these lines ever since, so it is not surprising that differences are to be found in the overall structure of their brains. The split between what became mammals and birds came even earlier, sometime around 300 million years ago. Nevertheless, parrots and primates “show impressive convergence of complex cognitive abilities, and this is accompanied by convergent changes in the brain,” including relatively large brain size, telencephalon size, size of associative areas of the telencephalon, and increased connectivity between the telencephalon and cerebellum- though this increased connectivity has evolved over different neural pathways (Gutierrez-Ibanez et al., 2018, p. 5). “It has been suggested that intelligence in these taxa can only have arisen by convergent evolution,” observes cognitive biologist Nathan Emery:

driven by the need to solve comparable social and ecological problems; simple examination of six ecological variables across corvids, parrots, other birds, monkeys, apes, elephants and cetaceans reveals that certain preconditions correlate with the development of complex cognition: omnivorous generalist diet, highly social, large relative brain size, innovative, long developmental period, extended longevity, and variable habitat, [and] this exercise suggests that the evolution of intelligence was highly correlated with the ability to think and act flexibly within an ever-changing environment. (Emery, 2005, p. 37)”

“The same can be said about the conditions under which our own Species evolved, of course, placing us within the spectrum of cognitively complex animals, one with a very high degree of behavioral flexibility indeed.”

https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Political_Science_and_Civics/Human_Security_in_World_Affairs_-_Problems_and_Opportunities_2e_(Lautensach_and_Lautensach)/11%3A_Our_War_Against_Nature_-_Ontology_Cognition_and_a_Constricting_Paradigm/11.3%3A_Seeing_the_Complexity_of_Nature

 

 

 

 

 

[swansont]

1 hour ago, Luc Turpin said:

Randomness

Mind, the usual kind or my kind, increases the probability of survival and reproduction. It does so by injecting intelligence (capacity to communicate, solve problems and decision making) into the process of natural selection. Being cunning in avoiding predators, developing strategies for finding food increases one’s chances of surviving. Also being crafty in attracting a mate also increases one’s chances of passing on genes to the next generation.

But you’ve claimed rather more than this.

I don’t think there’s any argument that intelligence can improve your chances of survival. From an evolutionary standpoint it’s a tradeoff of whether it’s worth it, because a bigger, more complicated brain requires more resources.

 

1 hour ago, Luc Turpin said:

Complexity and mind in Nature

This summarizes all that I have been saying so far on this thread. The list of those contemplating mind as having a role in nature is getting longer. I do not feel any longer that I am the only fool crying wolf. The text is long, but a very worthwhile read. If too long for your taste, then read excerpts of it. Mounting evidence may very well one day contribute to a fundamental paradigm shift in science. Do I hear a ruffle or thunder in the forest?

Mounting evidence of what? That other organisms have intelligence? That’s not a paradigm shift. Are there scientists who think there is no intelligence in other animals? If “mind in nature” means something else, then you’ve not communicated it very well.

I do object to the way intelligence is used in some cases. If you took this same approach in physics we’d look at how an object accelerates when dropped but reaches a terminal velocity, or how a fluid in a system moves faster when pressure is lower, and ascribe it to intelligence, which is ludicrous. It dilutes the meaning of intelligence to bandy it about so casually.

As for the wall of text, that’s generally agreed to be an ineffective technique. You should not rely on the reader to pick an example. You’re making the argument, so you should be in a position to present the best example.

[Luc Turpin]

4 minutes ago, swansont said:

But you’ve claimed rather more than this.

I don’t think there’s any argument that intelligence can improve your chances of survival. From an evolutionary standpoint it’s a tradeoff of whether it’s worth it, because a bigger, more complicated brain requires more resources.

 

Mounting evidence of what? That other organisms have intelligence? That’s not a paradigm shift. Are there scientists who think there is no intelligence in other animals? If “mind in nature” means something else, then you’ve not communicated it very well.

I do object to the way intelligence is used in some cases. If you took this same approach in physics we’d look at how an object accelerates when dropped but reaches a terminal velocity, or how a fluid in a system moves faster when pressure is lower, and ascribe it to intelligence, which is ludicrous. It dilutes the meaning of intelligence to bandy it about so casually.

As for the wall of text, that’s generally agreed to be an ineffective technique. You should not rely on the reader to pick an example. You’re making the argument, so you should be in a position to present the best example.

1- I should not have done so

2- Then we agree on at least this.

3- This too is settled then. Do remember though that a very brief while ago, dogs had no feelings, let alone intelligence. Also, intelligence in organisms is not a paradigm shift, but mind as a fundamental aspect of nature or, maybe, of the universe as well is.

4- Agree that there is overreach in certain, but not all circumstances

5- Noted

[dimreepr]

On 7/3/2024 at 10:07 PM, Luc Turpin said:

2- Right from the begining I stated that mind was all over nature. Intelligence is the capacity to communicate, solve problems and make decision. If it does not do that, then it is not intelligent.

Indeed, but it strikes me that a rock falling from a height communicates its decent rather well; if it doesn't strike me, is it even moving?

On 7/4/2024 at 12:06 PM, Luc Turpin said:

Mind, the usual kind or my kind

There's your answer, if you think about it properly...

[Luc Turpin]

28 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Indeed, but it strikes me that a rock falling from a height communicates its decent rather well; if it doesn't strike me, is it even moving?

There's your answer, if you think about it properly...

1- But does the rock use the information to avoid or strike you?

2- Yes, to establish if intelligence is in nature, mind from brain or mind through brain, both can do the work. However, if intelligence is pervasive, all over, then mind though brain is a better fit.

Let me rephrase (1) Does the rock do anything with the information? And strike you or not, it is still moving as it is falling.

[Luc Turpin]

Again, a surprise finding

Simple movement like pushing a button sends ripples of activity throughout networks of neurons spanning across the brain.  This challenges the notion that distinct areas of the brain are dedicated to specific functions. It is probably not only limited to movement, but to other systems like vision and touch.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1741-2552/acae0a

[CharonY]

1 hour ago, Luc Turpin said:

Again, a surprise finding

Simple movement like pushing a button sends ripples of activity throughout networks of neurons spanning across the brain.  This challenges the notion that distinct areas of the brain are dedicated to specific functions. It is probably not only limited to movement, but to other systems like vision and touch.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1741-2552/acae0a

I think the conclusion you provide is an oversimplification. It is common knowledge that a) even for relatively simple tasks many different brain areas are getting mobilized. The precise extent depends on how we measure activity (and how precisely) as well as how we stimulate activity (e.g. passively, actively, under stress etc.). b) the notion that all brain areas are hyper-specialized was pretty much outdated when I was a student. Areas have primary functions but stimulation by activities can be distributed. c) canonical mappings are fundamentally best guesses based on the method used.

Electrophysiology is traditionally invasive  but non-invasive methods using machine learning to decode measurements have been implemented recently which I believe is the main gist of the paper (not my are of expertise). Brain-wide activity studies related to motor activation have been at least around for a more than a decade in animal studies.

I.e. the study is an extension of what we know, not a challenge to what we know.

 

[Luc Turpin]

1 hour ago, CharonY said:

I think the conclusion you provide is an oversimplification. It is common knowledge that a) even for relatively simple tasks many different brain areas are getting mobilized. The precise extent depends on how we measure activity (and how precisely) as well as how we stimulate activity (e.g. passively, actively, under stress etc.). b) the notion that all brain areas are hyper-specialized was pretty much outdated when I was a student. Areas have primary functions but stimulation by activities can be distributed. c) canonical mappings are fundamentally best guesses based on the method used.

Electrophysiology is traditionally invasive  but non-invasive methods using machine learning to decode measurements have been implemented recently which I believe is the main gist of the paper (not my are of expertise). Brain-wide activity studies related to motor activation have been at least around for a more than a decade in animal studies.

I.e. the study is an extension of what we know, not a challenge to what we know.

 

The conclusion was taken from an article supporting the research, so maybe it presented an oversimplification of it. 

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-01-simple-motions-ripples-brain.html

a)and b) That touch, vision and hearing would send ripples of activity throughout networks of neurons spanning across the brain (this study) and that thought would make almost instantaneous muilti-circuits structural changes (the study that I am trying to get from Jon Lieff) was common knowledge? Also, why are we still trying to "map out" the brain and talking about modularity, hemispheric and functional specialization? c) best guess, yes, but based on probability and the probability is high! is it not? Brain-wide activity in mice in particular has been determined for a while. However, because of the invasivness of the procedure, is it not this a first for humans?

[CharonY]

Yes, it is again the issue of science vs pop science.

Edit, tbf the article actually states:

Quote

The finding highlights just how complex the human brain is, challenging the simplified textbook picture of distinct brain areas dedicated to specific functions.

Which is a fair assessment. Depending on the level of textbooks some may simplify it to that degree.

28 minutes ago, Luc Turpin said:

a)and b) That touch, vision and hearing would send ripples of activity throughout networks of neurons spanning across the brain (this study) and that thought would make almost instantaneous muilti-circuits structural changes (the study that I am trying to get from Jon Lieff) was common knowledge?

 

There is no instantaneous structural change unless you use it in an unusual way. There are activity changes (and while there are molecular changes, they are typically not lasting after single activation from what I remember). And yes, we always knew that the brain does not have e.g. a push-button area. Rather any activity is a complex process involving many factors, e.g. you have sensory processes (you hear someone tell you to push a button) you have to interpret these sounds (cognitive processes) you have to motivate yourself to initiate movement, you have to see where the button is you have to initiate movement and so on. Of course you need various parts of the brain engaged in a coordinated way and very fast, too.

[Luc Turpin]

14 minutes ago, CharonY said:

Yes, it is again the issue of science vs pop science.

Edit, tbf the article actually states:

Which is a fair assessment. Depending on the level of textbooks some may simplify it to that degree.

 

There is no instantaneous structural change unless you use it in an unusual way. There are activity changes (and while there are molecular changes, they are typically not lasting after single activation from what I remember). And yes, we always knew that the brain does not have e.g. a push-button area. Rather any activity is a complex process involving many factors, e.g. you have sensory processes (you hear someone tell you to push a button) you have to interpret these sounds (cognitive processes) you have to motivate yourself to initiate movement, you have to see where the button is you have to initiate movement and so on. Of course you need various parts of the brain engaged in a coordinated way and very fast, too.

1- Ok, agree, pop science overstated again

2 and 3-'The finding highlights just how complex the human brain is, challenging the simplified textbook picture of distinct brain areas dedicated to specific functions." - still a prety important statement; of substantive changes required to the common notion..

4- I hope of getting the references to almost instantaneous structural changes, so we can both have a look at it. Not confident though as the author has yet to respond to my request. For the rest of the paragraph, I agree with what is said with one distiontion; the study seems to indicate one action affecting the whole brain, not one action one brain part with the consequence that more than one brain part is being solicited because of multiple actions. Does that sound right?

[TheVat]

Panpsychism, biopsychism, radical emergence, clever slime molds, and various empirical approaches to consciousness are explored in this Vox article.  Perhaps a useful bit of background reading to the chat.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/353430/what-if-absolutely-everything-is-conscious

 

 

 

[Luc Turpin]

13 hours ago, TheVat said:

Panpsychism, biopsychism, radical emergence, clever slime molds, and various empirical approaches to consciousness are explored in this Vox article.  Perhaps a useful bit of background reading to the chat.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/353430/what-if-absolutely-everything-is-conscious

 

 

 

There can be no reasonable discussion of mind without reading the above referenced article.

The main points to me of the article are as follows

• Is it just all about mechanistic response with no feeling behind or is there intent?
• Once animals were no longer viewed as mechanistic bundles of instinct, where does it stop?
• There is still no proper theory about how or why consciousness arises;
• Consciousness is basically a story of scaling. As matter scales up into more complex creatures, the degree of consciousness shoots up, too.
• No aha emergence magical appearance of mind with panpsychism and hard problem bypass
• Maybe materialism entails panpsychism (consciousness is real; everything is physical; therefore consciousness is physical; there's no emergence in nature; consciousness emerging from totally non-conscious stuff would be emergence; therefore, all stuff must have some consciousness baked into it.
• Life forms without brains or nervous systems show signs of cognition
• Are networks of electrical signals making possible memory storage, learning, problem solving?
• Cognition (functional abilities we can observe from a third-person perspective; consciousness (what it feels like to be a creature from that creature's own perspective) The former can be explored by science while the latter cannot.
• All life is sense-making
• Biopsychism - all living organisms and only living organisms are conscious;
• How low can you go - humans, animals, plants, cells, atoms?
• Consciousness at the atomic level would look like physics;
• The biggest challenge to panpsychism is the combination problem - If the tiniest particles have conscious experiences, how exactly do they combine to produce a more complex thing with its own conscious experience?
• Table are not conscious because the parts are not interacting together - no unity going on with the table, whereas with a plant, there really is clear unity. A plant is a goal-directed system with unity of purpose
• Panpsychists and materialists cannot disprove one another’s camp, because there is no evidence either way;
• "The difference between them may be more methodological than anything else. Materialism restricts itself to what it can establish empirically, testable detail by testable detail, with the hope of groping its way toward a broad theoretical framework. Panpsychism has historically let itself dream big, starting out with the broad theory and hoping to fill in the details later. What’s exciting is that scientists like Levin are now combining the methodology of materialism with the theory of panpsychism, seeing how they might fit together. These scientists are digging right underneath the wall that was erected in the 17th century — the one that split matter from mind. Where that will lead is anyone’s guess."