That doesn't simplify anything because 'sense' is just as emotionally charged as 'sentient' and 'feel'.
My computer 'senses' things too, a momentary push of the power switch for one, and you can buy all kinds of 'sensors': pressure, temperature, light, sound, you name it. So the example, and confusion, stands exactly the same with your 'easier' word as it did with the other.
You use the emotional word "threat," again implying 'knowledge', 'intelligence', and self awareness (to 'know' what would otherwise happen is 'bad' to 'self' and, so, 'intentionally' avoid it) but my computer 'senses' the UPS power fail signal and shuts down to avoid the 'threat' of data corruption. Is it 'sentient' as you seem to claim the ameba is?
If you answer yes then I again submit that the words have little or no meaning. and certainly not the emotional extrapolation to consciousness. If you say no then I ask you to explain why one is but the other isn't since they both meet your 'sense' criteria, even to 'avoiding a threat'.
If, however, you meant to say the ameba is a biological 'mechanism', in the 'not a conscious, thinking, feeling, being' sense people conceptualize the meaning (I.E. "it's just a machine."), then I'd agree.
The Humvee (HMMWV) is a formidable vehicle on or off road and, like the memorable Jeep before it, been adapted to many configurations for the Army and Marine Corps.
The Hummer H1 is close to a Humvee, but street and civilian legal.
The H2 is a Chevy 4WD picku frame with a boxy imitation-Hummer body bolted on. Most of the ones I have seen have lots of fancy chrome doodads (like spinner hubs) and never any mud.
The H3 abandons all pretense of being a rugged vehicle in an attempt to bring the Hummer logo into a lower price range. Buying one makes about as much sense as buying Porsche sunglasses.
If we were in casual conversation and you were using 'smart' in the same manner everyone else does in that kind of context I might let it slide but you're playing a game of deceptive semantics.
To wit, when people use 'smart' in that context they generally mean a technologically 'sophisticated' device, often involving some form of automation as in a 'smart' bomb. They do not mean it's a 'sentient being', nor 'on the road' to becoming one, nor do they intend to suggest one should consult it on matters of morality or use it as a morality 'role model'.
So, what I will 'admit' is that a flush toilet is more technologically advanced than an outhouse.
In the sense that it's more 'biologically advanced', at least in our 'judgment', than a pool of ammonia, yes.
It isn't 'smart' and neither are what you call the 'critters' it runs up against.
The "for that matter _all_ of us" is a non sequitur. Whether I, or anyone, completely 'understands' a thing says nothing whatsoever about the state of that thing's 'smarts'. To wit, we do not have a complete understanding of quantum mechanics but that doesn't make quarks 'smart'.
I didn't 'forget' anything. It's simply that there's an example of a few million cases for at least ONE dern cell to give a whit it let it's host die
That's because it doesn't give a 'shit' about anything at all nor is it capable of giving a 'shit' about anything.
'They're' not 'concerned' about anything whatsoever. 'They' are not 'afraid' of dying, there aren't any little white blood cell medals awarded for 'bravery' nor court martials for 'cowardice in the face of the enemy', nor are there little 'white blood cell funerals' when they croak.
'They' haven't a clue they're 'protecting' anything, that any place is 'home', or that you'll live or die one way or the other.
These are all judgments *you* apply to the situation because *you* give a tinker's dam what the outcome is.
Yes.
The immune system is identical in that what's 'good' or 'bad' is the human judgment of it with the difference being man created the toilet while evolution created the other. Well, there's a second difference in that man had a 'plan' in creating the toilet but according to evolution there's no plan to it, which excludes any notion of evolution 'good' or 'bad', or morality.
It is simply complex (biological) chemicals responding to chemical conditions and there's no more 'sentience' involved than iron rusting in the presence of oxygen.
And the reason it doesn't 'usually' attack the host body is because the ones it did died before being able to reproduce so that screwed up chemical combination didn't propagate.
That would be in line with traditional behaviorist theory but quantum mechanics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, and chaos theory present serious obstacles to a fully deterministic model.
Not to mention we're wholly incapable of relating cognitive processes (past global 'mood' effects) to chemical terms so other means must be employed.
Well, actually, no there isn't because for communication to take place there has to be a common frame of reference and I have no idea what alternate reality you're speaking from right now.
Gotta hand it to you, that was indeed a simple answer. You could resolve a lot of grand issues with that sort of reasoning.
I wouldn't presume. But since DNA is complex enough to define and design the entire human organism, "conscious" brain included, it would seem to at least be in the running.
That's not entirely clear as a lot transpires between the first cell, growth, and 'consciousness'. For example, would 'consciousness' be achieved in a sensory deprived environment? I don't know, and I'm not sure anyone does, but that (the environment) would be 'information' beyond what's provided by DNA.
Perhaps but it seems to be pretty much occupied with all the tasks it's already got in hand. Not to mention it isn't clear that a 'lot of stored information' necessarily leads to 'consciousness'. You might just get a really big library ;)
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