(August 29, 2016 at 2:03 pm)Arkilogue Wrote:(August 29, 2016 at 1:23 pm)Whateverist Wrote: That is a good question, isn't it. And yet the 'sacrifice' those 20% make is really no greater than the sacrifice the cells of a multi-cellular creature make in becoming one of a kazillion bone cells or a white blood cell or any of the others including those dead skin cells on the surface of our skin which you mention. Apparently, it doesn't work to anthropomorphize by imputing our subjective states into the actions of a single cell. Very likely neither a bone cell nor any of the mold stalk cells feels heroic. They lack anything we'd recognize as subjective states. But the process of selection works as well with built in 'sacrifice' of individuals for the survival of the kind (species/family/etc) as it does for the selection of individual multi-cell creatures. The living material survives to perpetuate its kind and that keeps the ball rolling, no celebratory subjective states necessary.
How do we know they have no subjective states?
Please re-read more carefully.
(August 29, 2016 at 2:03 pm)Arkilogue Wrote: In fact what are our subjective states? Are they thoughts or feelings? Do plants have feelings and react to stimuli and learn? Yes.
http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-01-09/ne...out-plants
Well .. not just because an author we both like says so. As Rhythm says, no doubt he was exercising poetic license. Certainly his expertise wouldn't enable hime to support such a strong claim.
Sunflowers turn their heads to face the sun all day each day. Would a depressed sun flower figure "why bother" and take a day off? Do you think the action of a sunflower plant to align the face of its flowers with the sun is evidence of intention in plants? What need have plants of subjective states? What organs do they have to produce them? Actions don't bespeak either intention or subjective states, no more than complexity of structure is evidence of design.
