Detecting design or intent in nature

[Angrboda]

1b. Where the operation of Heywood systems is unlike the operation of biological evolution, the genesis of biological evolution is probably unlike the genesis of Heywood systems;

3. The operation of Heywood systems is unlike that of the operation of biological evolution in that Heywood systems require intellect, whereas biological evolution

I think there is a fatal problem with premise 3. The spider sim is an example of a Heywood system that requires intellect for its genesis but does not require intellect for its operation. Set up a computer powered by a radioisotope thermoelectric generator to run the sim and it would continue to run it just fine for quite a long time even if all the intellects were sterilized.

You'll have to refresh my memory on what the spider sim is. However, if it's like most simulations based on genetic algorithms, I'd argue that it does require the involvement of intellect in its operation. I don't know whether you're old enough to remember text based adventure games, but they were very popular at one time. "Text adventures are one of the oldest types of computer games and form a subset of the adventure genre. The player uses text input to control the game, and the game state is relayed to the player via text output. Input is usually provided by the player in the form of simple sentences such as "get key" or "go east", which are interpreted by a text parser."(Wikipedia) In the game you would visit different locations described in text, such as, "You are in a clearing. Paths lead east and west." The point to all this is that the person playing the game had to "imagine" what the locations would be like if they were real. The same thing occurs in computer games. A two-dimensional display splashes a bunch of colors on the screen such that our brain and visual systems interpret them as 3D objects and motion. In a simple chess game, you have to interpret the display as a virtual chessboard. In the spider sim, if it's the one I'm thinking of, you have to interpret the image as a moving robot; else it's just numbers and colors. So all computer simulations require involvement of intellect to imagine them as if they were real.

Furthermore, since genetic algorithm programs are intentionally made to copy biological evolution, there is a mundane reason why they resemble it and are analogous to it, rather than other Heywood systems. The features of the operation of genetic algorithm programs aren't accidental features, and their likeness to biological evolution is readily explained by the intention of the designers. It seems inappropriate to count them as they are designed to be like biological evolution.

Regardless, I'd like to introduce another Heywood system. Many first-person video games share the traits of replication, heritability, change, and selection. The player character in the game is replicated each time it "dies" in the game, giving the player another chance to evolve new strategies. The heritable traits are stored in the game player whose game play evolves and develops with each iteration of the player character. There is change, both in the player's strategy, as well as random elements in the game. And there is selection in that those strategies which do not meet the demands of a game level are pruned off.

The reason I introduce them as a Heywood system is because my argument as stated is based on probabilities (see premises 1a and 1b). The more Heywood systems whose operation involves intellect, the more probable that any Heywood system chosen will require intellect in both halves. And there are probably several thousand times as many instances of computer game Heywood systems as genetic algorithm systems. This restores the combined validity of 1b and 3 because there are many times more Heywood systems whose operation involves intellect than systems whose operation does not.

Venter's Mycoplasma Laboratorium is another example of a Heywood system which required intellect for its genesis, but its subsequent evolution does not require intellect.

The nucleotide sequence is based on the bacterium Mycoplasma genitalium which the team pared down to the bare essentials needed to support life, removing a fifth of its genetic make-up.

Mycoplasma laboratorium, the first synthetic organism

M. laboratorium is a biological organism altered and replicated by artificial means. It is a part of biological evolution, not of Heywood systems. They wouldn't have been able to do it without the design from nature.