Why so sour? You can read all about the biophysics in Peter Hoffman’s Life’s Ratchet.

Without form there is no matter; matter consists in in-formation. Abstraction evolves as an activity of complex in-formed matter.

A circle of inter-independent origination. — Janus

Yep.

I generally agree with your analysis, but the issue that I have is with the idea that mind is the output or consequence of fundamentally physical processes — Wayfarer

But aren’t I saying the process is fundamentally informational, as well? And that the source of the stably persisting identity of a mindful, purposeful, organism is to be found nowhere in the matter of which it is composed?

So this is a dualism without the causal problems. This is a dualism where the complementary nature of stabilising ideas and labile hardware gets rid of the usual “dead matter” descriptions of life and mind.

The mainstream neo-darwinian view is that life began in the apocryphal 'warm pond' by some as-yet undetermined process involving some combination of heat, pressure, and complex chemistry — Wayfarer

That is old hat now. The other really good new popularisation is Nick Lane’s The Vital Question which shows how life must have started around some active chemical flow. Luke warm alkaline ocean vents are a good candidate.

So the problem with a warm pond is that it stabilises - goes to equilibrium - very quickly. But a sea vent is a themal/chemical flow. It is an active instability. And Lane makes the argument for how life first arose as a managing force in that kind of scenario.

However, this still does seem a generally physicalist account, in that it seems to assume that the biochemical gives rise to, or is prior to, the symbolic - that the ability to speak and abstract is itself the product of biochemistry. So I don't see how here the distinction between information and matter is really maintained - the former is simply an outcome of the latter. — Wayfarer

Well it ain’t a generally material account if it says that symbols or information are nature’s other aspect. So it may be generally physicalist, but it is a semiotic physicalism. It is a full four causes physicalism. And that is hardly a regular notion of physicalism - for the guy in the street anyway. Actual physics has already jumped on the information theoretic/dissipative structure bandwagon and so is cool with this paradigm.

What, here, do I have to justify? I think you want to expand this list into areas where, if you make a claim, it's you who have to justify it. — tim wood

In the list you’ve provided, the need for justification would apply to (4). You state as fact that telos is “simply abstract fiction” when applied to trees. If this proposition is true, what is its justification? Can you justify it by any other means than the supposition of a causally deterministic physicalism fully composed of infinite chains of efficient causation?

One should keep in mind that awareness of other and its processes is not located within something physical, like in a pineal gland when it comes to vertebrates. Awareness is a gestalt form that is—I’ll say “fully correlated” to keep the causal process as ambiguous as possible—fully correlated with its substrata of physical information. This applies to living humans—at least when not addressing eliminativism. On what rational grounds would it not also apply to living dogs, insects, nematodes, sponges, fungi, plants, and prokaryotes?

I’ve done my best to try to introduce arguments for telos to you—this in a longwinded post that someone hereabouts bothered to write and to post to you. Its introductory arguments have been wholly ignored as though never posted, and I don’t like repeating arguments that then go unaddressed.

I’ve also warned against anthropocentric mindsets when it comes to awareness and goal-seeking. But your arguments keep coming back around to anthropocentric concepts of each, and this without bothering to enquire into what non-anthropocentric aspects of these would be. Awareness of other is not necessarily something visual, nor something contingent on the presence of a skull, nor something one must be capable of thinking about. Goal-searching does not need to be about consciously formulating a plan and then setting out to achieve it; it is often enacted instinctively even in us self-aware humans. We ourselves are aware of gravity via our vestibular ducts that facilitate balance—and most often are not conscious of it. And this only one example. We ourselves do things essential to the purpose/goal of sustaining life—from our breathing and blinking to our drive to eliminate wastes when present—without a prevailing conscious apprehension of purpose in so doing. Nevertheless, we are aware of gravity and we do breath so as to facilitate the cellular respiration required for the metabolism of our bodies’ individual cells.

I’m not looking for bickering. From the sum of our previous posts, however, it appears to me that we’ve been talking past each other. It happens sometimes, but there's not much point to further debate when it does. I’m more than OK with currently letting things be as they are.

However the reason why the symbol part of the equation - the stuff like the genetic memory that can encode constraints - can actually work is that it acts to regulate the unstable. If the physics has rigid stability, how could information push it in any direction? But if the physics is balanced on an instability, a point of bifurcation, then it is like a switch that can be tipped by the barest nudge.

So that is how semiotic control can arise. That is how symbols can control states of matter. The matter has to be in a state that is inherently unstable and hence able to be nudged in a direction that is some higher level informational choice.

That is the trick of life. It is the combination of information and matter, a system able to be directed with a purpose because the matter is poised to be tipped and has the least amount of telos concerning its actual state as is possible.

Stable matter knows what it wants to be. It is deterministic. But instability is freedom just begging to be harnessed. It solves the mystery of how symbols could affect the actions of anything.

And how life goes is how mind goes. The same applies when it comes to closing the explanatory gap between matter and symbol there. — apokrisis

Right, that's why homeostasis, and its assumed goal of "stability" is an inappropriate description of living systems. The systems do not have stability as a goal at all, because stability would rob them of the capacity to do things. As you say "the matter has to be in a state that is inherently unstable". Why do you find it so difficult to agree with me, even when you are saying the same thing anyway?

Theories of homeostasis dictate that living systems have the goal of setting up stable equilibriums, that's how the living system is described, as a stable equilibrium. But what you have just said is completely opposed to this idea, the living systems are setting up unstable material conditions, not stable conditions.

Right, that's why homeostasis, and its assumed goal of "stability" is an inappropriate description of living systems. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, you have to be generally able to centre if you want to be able to go off-centre for particular reasons.

To ride a bike, you need to be able to balance upright so that you can also maintain your balance by leaning over on corners.

Why do you find it so difficult to agree with me, even when you are saying the same thing anyway? — Metaphysician Undercover

You know why. You take whatever I say and say it backwards.

Theories of homeostasis dictate that living systems have the goal of setting up stable equilibriums, that's how the living system is described, as a stable equilibrium. But what you have just said is completely opposed to this idea, the living systems are setting up unstable material conditions, not stable conditions. — Metaphysician Undercover

What don't you get about the difference between the general and the particular?

An organism must be able to both persist and to adapt. In the long run, it must be stably centred or balanced - hence homeostasis. In the short run, it must be able to adjust that general balance in locally useful ways.

The child first learns to stay upright on a bike. Then it learns to lean into corners.

Actually this is more an issue with novice motorcyclists or pillion passengers. It takes some persuading for newbies to let their bodies "fall over" with the bike rather than keep nicely upright on a sharp bend.

So what you miss here is that the "contradiction" is the point. As usual, we are talking about the symmetry-breaking logic of a dichotomy. You need contrasting limits to allow for the further thing of hierarchical organisation.

An organism has autonomy because it can make an active distinction between its long-term central balance and its moment-to-moment fine adjustments.

It is not my problem if your understand of biological terminology insists on a more inflexible reading - one that is either/or rather than and/both.

An organism must be able to both persist and to adapt. In the long run, it must be stably centred or balanced - hence homeostasis. In the short run, it must be able to adjust that general balance in locally useful ways. — apokrisis

There is no "long run" for an organism. They are born, eat, get active, reproduce, and die. This idea that homeostasis is necessary for an organism to persist and adapt is a falsity. Individual organisms do not persist, and adaptation is the result of change, brought about through reproduction. This describes instability.

What don't you get about the difference between the general and the particular? — apokrisis

We are discussing particulars. If each particular displays itself as an instance of instability, then it is extremely faulty inductive reasoning to draw the conclusion that in general, these instances of instability are an example of stability.

The child first learns to stay upright on a bike. Then it learns to lean into corners. — apokrisis

To stay upright on a bike requires forward motion, pedaling, and this is a form of instability, not stability. The hardest part of learning to ride a bike is giving up the fear of leaving the stability of the solid ground, to propel oneself forward into a realm of instability.

An organism has autonomy because it can make an active distinction between its long-term central balance and its moment-to-moment fine adjustments. — apokrisis

There is no such thing as an organism's "long term central balance", that's a fiction. And to think that an organism could recognize such a thing within itself, and distinguish this from its moment to moment activities is simply nonsense. Even the most rational of living beings, the human being, with the power of self-reflection, cannot distinguish a long term central balance within oneself.

It is not my problem if your understand of biological terminology insists on a more inflexible reading - one that is either/or rather than and/both. — apokrisis

My training in logic has taught me that "both", when it comes to contradictory attributes for the same subject at the same time, is unacceptable. If you want to do your biology in this contradictory way, then I think that is your problem.

There is no "long run" for an organism. — Metaphysician Undercover

Here we go....

To stay upright on a bike requires forward motion, pedaling, and this is a form of instability, not stability. — Metaphysician Undercover

What a horrendous self-contradiction. You claim that to be moving forward steadily is unstable? Next thing you will be claiming Newton was wrong about inertia!

There is no such thing as an organism's "long term central balance", that's a fiction. — Metaphysician Undercover

...and on we trundle....

If you want to do your biology in this contradictory way, then I think that is your problem. — Metaphysician Undercover

Great. As ever, I am happy to be in contradiction to your arse-backwards thinking.

What a horrendous self-contradiction. You claim that to be moving forward steadily is unstable? Next thing you will be claiming Newton was wrong about inertia! — apokrisis

The forward motion is dependent on the pedalling. Where does this "steadily" that you've fictitiously inserted come from?

Is the motion constant and long-run in terms of its direction or not? Make up your mind. Either the bicycle is going forward or it ain't. Simple logic.

1. The tree is alive.
— tim wood

Do you think that plant life is representative of all forms of life, or that there might be attributes and characteristics that animals and humans have that trees don't. — Wayfarer

In respect of life, I don't know. It's a personal problem of mine that I sometimes miss the obvious, so maybe there is some obvious reason that life in itself differs from form to form.

As to the form, sure, lots and lots of differences.

As to being representative, I suppose that a life form is representative of all forms only in so far as they share similar characteristics, and in terms of those characteristics, but not beyond.

These are obvious answers, though. What are you aiming at?

In the list you’ve provided, the need for justification would apply to (4). — javra

4. It can be convenient and useful to refer to trees as acting in accord with purpose, or motive, or telos, but these accounts are simply abstract fictions, there being nothing in the tree where purpose or motive or telos occurs. Unless these are just abstract and general terms for reacting to stimuli, or acting per DNA. — tim wood

One should keep in mind that awareness of other and its processes is not located within something physical, like in a pineal gland when it comes to vertebrates. Awareness is a gestalt form that is—I’ll say “fully correlated” to keep the causal process as ambiguous as possible—fully correlated with its substrata of physical information. This applies to living humans—at least when not addressing eliminativism. On what rational grounds would it not also apply to living dogs, insects, nematodes, sponges, fungi, plants, and prokaryotes? — javra

What you're calling me to justify, near as I can tell, is the proposition that attributing motive, purpose, telos, to trees is at best a convenient fiction, unless it is just general and abstract terminology used to describe either reacting to stimuli or acting per DNA. The only grounds for objection are that you maintain that the tree has, possesses, exhibits motive, purpose, telos, and these not to be confused with mere response to stimuli or its DNA.

I have a long reply in mind - but maybe a shorter way is better, and if it doesn't work, then the longer.

Earlier you wrote that it was useless to call the movement of a billiard ball struck by another billiard ball the result of the ball's telos. Mechanics suffices and the notion of telos adds nothing - I agree.

I am distinguishing between immediate reaction to stimuli and mediate reaction to stimuli. If you're not making that distinction, then we've found a problem, maybe the problem. Immediate reactions are nothing more than mechanics in biological-chemical form. The actions of trees are of this sort (or DNA driven). Mediate reactions are a different story. If the reaction is mediate, then you can have all the motive, purpose, telos, you think you need. The govering characteristic of a mediate reaction is that there is action/stimuli - mediation, something else that happens that is not an immediate reaction - then reaction. It seems to me that the motive, purpose, telos, lives in the mediation.

Your position is, then, that there are reactions in a tree that are 1) immediate, but motived, purposed, teleological, or 2) mediate.

Examples of immediate reactions in people would be the reflexive withdrawing of a hand from a hot surface, an eye-blink to keep a cinder or a fly away, jumping at being frightened, & etc.. Two others I can think of are even quicker: the reaction to an electric shock, the reaction to being penetrated by a high-speed bullet. In all cases, the body reacts before awareness occurs, before anything mediate occurs.

Let's try a complex example in a tree - I do not even know if this happens. The air in a forest becomes very hot because of a fire. The tree draws water from its root system to its trunk and branches; perhaps it can even shed leaves. Can any of this be motived, purposed, teleological?

What, actually, has happened? The surface of the tree reacted to a high temperature. From where the high temperature was encountered, signals went to other parts of the tree. The other parts of the tree, upon receiving the signals, moved the tree's internal water around, and maybe sucked more out of the ground. All this per the tree's DNA. (As I say, I have no information this happens; I'm just making it up.)

This is susceptible of description in teleological terms, and it would be a very convenient way to describe it. But where is the mediation? What mediated What/where is the awareness? Where is any evidence that the tree did anything other than immediately react to stimuli?

I have two definitions of teleology, here, neither exhaustive, but they see to cover it:
PHILOSOPHY
the explanation of phenomena by the purpose they serve rather than by postulated causes.
THEOLOGY
the doctrine of design and purpose in the material world.

And part of the point is that my claims are minimal; yours are additive. Can you justify attributing awareness, mediateness, to living things that don't have the capacity? Or if you claim they have the capacity, can you say were it is or how it works? If you're going to argue for immediate, unmediated awareness that is not immediate reaction, please do a good job!

Or if all you mean is that the so-called behaviour serves a purpose, then it's teleological, then have at it. But I think Apokrisis correctly assesses this usage:

Or else it deflates the rather inflated notion of telos that folk have in the first place. — apokrisis

As to being representative, I suppose that a life form is representative of all forms only in so far as they share similar characteristics, and in terms of those characteristics, but not beyond.

These are obvious answers, though. What are you aiming at? — tim wood

You seem to have said more than once in this thread that 'the tree' is emblematic of 'living things generally' and that, as 'trees' seem to be something that might be understood in terms of molecular interactions, then so too might the doings of intentional beings such as humans. That seems to be the tendency of your thinking, anyway.

Furthermore, although Apokrisis does indeed say that his interpretation of telos

deflates the rather inflated notion of telos that folk have in the first place — apokrisis

he also acknowledges that 'semiotic physicalism' is

a full four-causes physicalism. — apokrisis

where two of those four causes are the 'formal' and 'final' causes that were found in Aristotelian philosophy, but had been missing presumed dead in the early modern biological sciences. And I, for one, am still skeptical that they can be restored to science, within the confines of an entirely physicalist understanding of biology.

You’re wanting to further engage on the issue. There’s a lot in your last post that I disagree with. I’ll take one issue at a time. We so far seem to agree that a tree can respond to stimuli. So I’ll start with this.

1) We have stimuli (which stimulate actions) on the one hand and something which is responding to it (via actions and reactions) on the other. The two—the stimulus and that which responds to it—cannot logically be identical.

Do we agree?

2) You presume that what is responding are specific parts of the tree’s DNA (which cause immediate actions on their own, to use your terminology) rather than the tree as the total metabolizing process of a multicellular organisms—a total self-regulating process that results from the set of its individual molecular subcomponents (including nucleic acids) found within its many individual cells.

Is this correct?

If (1) and (2) are deemed correct by you, please explain how DNA can respond to anything when addressed as a physical molecule operating in isolation—explaining this in manners either accordant to the empirical sciences of biology or to metaphysical logic.

Why I disagree with this just mentioned hypothesis: A living cell is negentropic, metabolizing, and homeostatic. These attributes apply to a total gestalt process that results from all molecular subcomponents interacting with each other. In rough parallel to a brain that is removed from the rest of a body being dead, a cell’s nucleus removed from the rest of the cell is non-negentropic, non-metabolizing, and non-homeostatic; i.e. non-living, and hence dead. This same attribute of nonliving is even more applicable to portions of DNA isolated from the nucleus. A tree is a multicellular organism, meaning that what is negentropic, metabolizing, and homeostatic is the gestalt process resulting from the collection of all individual tree cells simultaneously interacting with each other. Therefore, when a tree responds to stimuli, it cannot be due to some portions of its physical DNA holding immediate mechanical effects upon both the tree’s behavior and physiology. Rather it is due to the negentropic, metabolizing, homeostatic process of the tree in total—itself a gestalt, or at least collective, manifestation of the negentropic, metabolizing, homeostatic process of its individual cells (of which nucleic acids serve as only one molecular constituent of). This, in turn, entails that that which responds to stimuli is not individual portions of DNA but the negentropic, metabolizing, homeostatic process of the tree as a living multicellular organism.

If you find errors to this argument I’ve provided, either due to a disparity with the data obtained from the empirical sciences of biology or due to erroneous metaphysical logic, please inform me of what these errors are. But please ensure that these disagreements you might hold are based on facts or on logic, and not on imaginative hypotheticals.

An interesting tidbit I just haphazardly came across - this due to the wonders of directed advertising. Among all the other things that trees do, turns out trees also sleep at night … in an non-anthropocentric way.

Why the scientific finding that trees “sleep” at night is beautiful

One of the anecdotes I remember from the popular science book, Supernature, is that oysters kept in a tank in the bottom of a mine, in the middle of the continental USA, still open and close with the tides, even though they’re nowhere near the ocean. Everything in nature moves in rythm.

Please provide a one or two sentence definition for each of the following terms as used in your post:
1) Matter
2) Symbol
3) Encode
4) Genetic Memory
5) Information
6) Purpose
7) Stable
8) Instability

You think?

Not likely. That would defeat the purpose of ambiguity.
Thanks for proving my point.

But we've already discussed your odd fetish for definitions.

Is the motion constant and long-run in terms of its direction or not? — apokrisis

No of course not. How many times do have to say it? It starts with the pedaling, and may stop with the brakes at any moment, and the direction changes with the steering. There is nothing "constant and long-run" here. It's a fiction which you've made up to support homeostasis. And I really don't know why you're so bent on supporting homeostasis when you clearly prefer to describe life's systems in the more realistic terms of instability. It's as if you cannot let go of the old, outdated, demonstrably false descriptions.

What you're calling me to justify, near as I can tell, is the proposition that attributing motive, purpose, telos, to trees is at best a convenient fiction, unless it is just general and abstract terminology used to describe either reacting to stimuli or acting per DNA. The only grounds for objection are that you maintain that the tree has, possesses, exhibits motive, purpose, telos, and these not to be confused with mere response to stimuli or its DNA. — tim wood

Doesn't "acting per DNA" demonstrate purpose, telos?

What, actually, has happened? The surface of the tree reacted to a high temperature. — tim wood

How can you say that reactions are not purposeful? Just because they are high speed, and occur immediately after, in response to, an external action, does not suffice as an argument to exclude purpose or telos. If someone says to me "there is a bear behind you", and I react by turning around, that it is a reaction does not mean that the turning around is not purposeful.

This is susceptible of description in teleological terms, and it would be a very convenient way to describe it. But where is the mediation? What mediated What/where is the awareness? Where is any evidence that the tree did anything other than immediately react to stimuli? — tim wood

The fact that we cannot draw a direct causal chain, in terms of efficient causation, from the thing which occurs, to the reaction, indicates that there is mediation, allowing for intent, telos, final cause . Some living actions and reactions are quite rapid, so we tend to think that the external occurrence "causes" the internal response, without mediation, but I don't think that this is the case. Javra argues this quite well.

Can you justify attributing awareness, mediateness, to living things that don't have the capacity? — tim wood

Neither of your definitions of teleology call for "awareness". You should consider that being aware is just one type of teleological (purposeful) activity.

Or if all you mean is that the so-called behaviour serves a purpose, then it's teleological, then have at it. But I think Apokrisis correctly assesses this usage:
Or else it deflates the rather inflated notion of telos that folk have in the first place. — apokrisis — tim wood

I don't see how this is the case, but apokrisis is commonly guilty over-generalizing in a fallacious way. As I said much earlier in the thread, in regard to "reason", we need to distinguish between an agent acting for a reason (purpose), having the reason or purpose for action within itself, and the reason (purpose) which we project onto a thing from outside, saying that the thing did this for this reason, or that it is good for this purpose, to us. Apokrisis continually conflates these two, and refuses to recognize a distinction between them.

It starts with the pedaling, and may stop with the brakes at any moment, and the direction changes with the steering. — Metaphysician Undercover

So all this stopping, starting and changing. Doesn’t it seem contradictory of you to assert that the forward motion represents the instability here when that instability is what you are imposing on its ... stability.

What would be the story if you weren’t so constantly busy stopping, starting and changing?

1) We have stimuli (which stimulate actions) on the one hand and something which is responding to it (via actions and reactions) on the other. The two—the stimulus and that which responds to it—cannot logically be identical.
Do we agree? — javra

Yes, with the qualification that maybe if we looked very closely at this, it might not be so simple. For now, agreed.

2) You presume that what is responding are specific parts of the tree’s DNA (which cause immediate actions on their own, to use your terminology) rather than the tree as the total metabolizing process of a multicellular organisms—a total self-regulating process that results from the set of its individual molecular subcomponents (including nucleic acids) found within its many individual cells.
Is this correct? — javra

Not exactly. I do not think of the DNA itself reacting. I only mention DNA because of the things trees do, some seem to be reactions to stimuli, some not. For the tree's doings not reactions to stimuli, I imagine the impetus comes from the DNA. After some more thought, maybe the instructions encoded in DNA are provisional, "If condition x applies, then do y." If that's the case, then it's all reaction to stimuli, and the qualification becomes that the reaction occurs within parameters set by the DNA. I accept your addition of the other functioning parts. I have a problem with "self-regulating" because it implies a self. Will you accept "internally regulated"?

In any case I still hold to the mediate/immediate distinction. I'll also say that intra-tree communication occurs only via channels within the tree, presumably by a cell-to-cell transmission of an electro-chemical signal.

If you find errors to this argument I’ve provided, either due to a disparity with the data obtained from the empirical sciences of biology or due to erroneous metaphysical logic, — javra

I think the only argument - disagreement - I have lies in what I take to be a reification of motive, purpose, telos, and now gestalt. As explanatory concepts - as ideas - they're all wonderful. But in my view they are not things. They can't be dissected with a scalpel or stored in a jar.

Plants grow around ponds. If you want to say that the plants want water, nothing wrong with that as poetical description. The trouble comes if you say that the plants actually want water. It's one thing to say they "act" like they "want' water. It's another to say they actually want water. That's the distinction I make, that I think you - and a lot of people - do not make. I assume you can make it when it's laid out like this, and I repent in sackcloth and ashes that I did not make this clearer, earlier.

And it goes beyond this. My understanding of Aristotle's four causes is that they were intended to provide causal explanations - to be answers to a set of questions. What's the account of this statue? Well, a sculptor got some limestone and carved into a shape he had in mind, a plan of sorts, to honor some God. I do not believe for a second that Aristotle thought that his four causes were how the statue got made. They're explanatory of his idea of causes, not the causes themselves.

As I said much earlier in the thread, in regard to "reason", we need to distinguish between an agent acting for a reason (purpose), having the reason or purpose for action within itself, and the reason (purpose) which we project onto a thing from outside, saying that the thing did this for this reason, or that it is good for this purpose, to us. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think of this set of distinctions in terms of causes, but that involves agency. Mainly, I agree. And further, I read that modern science has no use for causes, although it may still use the word for convenience. An analysis of cause, taken down to the root of it, shows an animistic bias that science has learned is illusory. It seems that between time t-1 of Cause c-1 and event E at time e-1, there is always an intermediate t-2, t-3 of intermediate causes c-2, c-3, until you arrive at simultaneity of C an E. There is no discrete agency of cause. (I'll review the argument and correct it if I've neglected a detail.)

I have a problem with "self-regulating" because it implies a self. Will you accept "internally regulated"? — tim wood

Internal entails a threshold between that which is within some given and outside of this same given. Where this very given whose internal aspects are solely address is an autopoietic system resulting from the simultaneous interaction of all subcomponents, the autopoietic processes of this system is the self that is being addressed. For clarity, because autopoiesis is negentropic, metabolizing, and homeostatic, it is that which we consider to be life. In the case of a tree, the living tree as opposed to a dead structure of wood protruding out of the ground.

What do you have in mind by the term “self” that serves as metaphysical impediment to its use in the context just outlined?

So its known, the term “self” is common to biology in addressing that which pertains to a living organism (to the “self” in relation to the "non-self"); see for example Wiktionary definition of “self” #4, including its example.

In any case I still hold to the mediate/immediate distinction. — tim wood

I would like for you to better spell out this distinction via causal processes. What I currently understand by it is that, from your belief system, “immediate” entails effects fully caused by efficient causation—something like billiard balls hitting each other at molecular and sub-molecular levels of reality. If my current interpretation is accurate, I as of yet do not understand what alternative causal process your belief system ascribes to “mediated” actions and reaction. Are they also fully composed of efficient causation, only that there just happens to be a medium in-between the stimuli and the outcome (with this something in-between also being a product of efficient causation)? If not, what causal mechanism other than that of efficient causation is at play in mediated reactions?

I'll also say that intra-tree communication occurs only via channels within the tree, presumably by a cell-to-cell transmission of an electro-chemical signal. — tim wood

So its known, electro-chemical signals solely define neurons and, hence, the processes of nervous systems. To the best of my knowledge they are not applicable to any known plant cell(s), which is one of the reasons that plants are such alien lifeforms to us nervous system endowed lifeforms.

I think the only argument - disagreement - I have lies in what I take to be a reification of motive, purpose, telos, and now gestalt. — tim wood

????

From Wiktionary: gestalt:

A collection of physical, biological, psychological or symbolic elements that creates a whole, unified concept or pattern which is other than the sum of its parts, due to the relationships between the parts (of a character, personality, entity, or being)

Where on earth do you find even a smidgen of reification in what I’ve said (here keeping things simple by only addressing gestalts)? Here; again summed up just for this purpose:

Life is a gestalt process. Any portion of the physical substrata which serves as a constituent of the gestalt process of life will be dead or dying when isolated from its interactions with all other material subcomponents from which life emerges as a gestalt process.

But in my view they are not things. They can't be dissected with a scalpel or stored in a jar. — tim wood

Yes, this is one of the attributes which gestalts hold (see definition above).

Since the issue of final causes, i.e. teleology, won’t go anywhere prior to resolving the basic issue of what is doing the responding to stimuli, I won’t currently address these portions of your last post.

I think of this set of distinctions in terms of causes, but that involves agency. Mainly, I agree. And further, I read that modern science has no use for causes, although it may still use the word for convenience. An analysis of cause, taken down to the root of it, shows an animistic bias that science has learned is illusory. It seems that between time t-1 of Cause c-1 and event E at time e-1, there is always an intermediate t-2, t-3 of intermediate causes c-2, c-3, until you arrive at simultaneity of C an E. There is no discrete agency of cause. (I'll review the argument and correct it if I've neglected a detail.) — tim wood

This difficulty with "cause" is why we're better off looking for the reason for an occurrence, why it occurred, rather than its cause. The distinction I was trying to make is the difference between the reason which is internal, inherent within the thing which is acting, and the reason which is assigned to the thing from an external source.

So for example, a person works at a job, as a member of a team, working on a project. The person's reason for working, the reason inherent within the person, might be to make money, and earn a living. The reason assigned to the person from the external source, the team manager, is the function which the person plays in the project. This is an example of how very different the internal and external reason for the activity might be. From the person working's point of view the work is carried out for the purpose of earning a living, that is the reason for the activity, and from the external point of view the work is carried out for the purpose of completing the project, that is the reason for the activity. Two very different reasons for the very same activity.

The function of a thing is the reason for a thing's activity in the external sense, a purpose which is assigned to it, in relation to a larger whole. So all the components of my computer have a function, a purpose, a reason for their activities in relation to the computer itself. However, the components do not have an internal reason, like a human being does, they do not have their own reason for being there. Their reason for being there has been assigned to them. However, despite the fact that inanimate things do not display their own internal reasons, we can infer that living beings other than human beings have their own internal reasons for behaving as they do. Clearly other mammals which have brains and think have their own reasons for their actions as well. Don't you think that trees and other plants have their own reasons for their actions as well?

think the only argument - disagreement - I have lies in what I take to be a reification of motive, purpose, telos, and now gestalt. As explanatory concepts - as ideas - they're all wonderful. But in my view they are not things. They can't be dissected with a scalpel or stored in a jar. — tim wood

If a thing has its own reasons, internal to it, for behaving like it does, what else can we attribute these reasons to, other than motive, purpose, or telos? Don't you recognize that not all things are physical things, capable of being cut with a scalpel, or stored in a jar? This is a fundamental principle of philosophy, to learn the distinction between material and immaterial things, as Plato said, sensible objects and intelligible objects. You can deny the reality of immaterial things, but then how do you account for your own motives, intention, and purpose, and other ideas? And once you see the need to allow for the reality of the immaterial, you'll come to realize that there's no reason to limit the existence of the immaterial to strictly within your own mind.

Plants grow around ponds. If you want to say that the plants want water, nothing wrong with that as poetical description. The trouble comes if you say that the plants actually want water. It's one thing to say they "act" like they "want' water. It's another to say they actually want water. That's the distinction I make, that I think you - and a lot of people - do not make. I assume you can make it when it's laid out like this, and I repent in sackcloth and ashes that I did not make this clearer, earlier. — tim wood

This is irrational nonsense. The plants display every action necessary to demonstrate that they want water, yet for some undisclosed, and most likely irrational reason, you deny that they want water. Must they say "I want water" in order for you to know that they want water? Sorry, plants can't speak English. If a person was dying from thirst, and making noises in some foreign language, would you say that the person acts like it wants water, but it doesn't really "want" water? What kind of a nonsense argument is this? When something carries out the actions required to call it by a certain name, we call it by that name. We don't say that the thing is not "really" acting in the way determined by this name, it's just making the appropriate actions which correspond to what that name signifies, but for some unknown reason it's not "really" acting in the way signified by the name.

However, despite the fact that inanimate things do not display their own internal reasons, we can infer that living beings other than human beings have their own internal reasons for behaving as they do.

Clearly other mammals which have brains and think have their own reasons for their actions as well. Don't you think that trees and other plants have their own reasons for their actions as well? — Metaphysician Undercover

Starting with a definition of human life, I would find it difficult to extrapolate a definition of plant life and natural life using the term "awareness". Because I define human awareness in terms of human anatomy, physiology, and mental capacity (i.e., sensory stimulation/perception, interoception/sensation, and cognition). Also because my knowledge of plant (and other) biology is inadequate to the task.

A possible solution is to use the term "awareness" defined differently for each species, and avoid equivocation by stipulating types of awareness (e.g., plant awareness, animal awareness, bacteria awareness, etc.). Then use "awareness" in a definition of natural life without stipulating type.

Starting with a definition of human mind, I would find it easier to extrapolate a definition of plant life and natural life using the term "mind" instead of "awareness".

For example, abstracting "human mind" (the set of conditions experienced, and functions exercised, by a human being which produce its behaviour) to "mind" (the set of conditions experienced, and functions exercised, by an organism which produce its behaviour).

...think the only argument - disagreement - I have lies in what I take to be a reification of motive, purpose, telos, and now gestalt. As explanatory concepts - as ideas - they're all wonderful. But in my view they are not things. They can't be dissected with a scalpel or stored in a jar. — tim wood

Is your mind a thing, or immaterial, or both, or neither?

If my current interpretation is accurate, I as of yet do not understand what alternative causal process your belief system ascribes to “mediated” actions and reaction. — javra

I burned my hand this morning under some hot water. My hand moved involuntarily. Later, when my toast was done, I had a choice between raspberry and blueberry jam; I chose both. The hand movement I call immediate, unmediated. The behaviour of choosing which jam, mediated.

Perhaps another way. The immediate action just happens, it couldn't be any other way. The mediate action represents a decision, and the action could have been this or that. If plants can make decisions and choose a course of action that could have been this or that or something else, it's more than I know.

From Wiktionary: gestalt:
A collection of physical, biological, psychological or symbolic elements that creates a whole, unified concept or pattern which is other than the sum of its parts, due to the relationships between the parts (of a character, personality, entity, or being)
Where on earth do you find even a smidgen of reification in what I’ve said — javra

"...which is other than the sum of its parts." Do you see it?

The distinction I make that you apparently do not make is that something like a gestalt is descriptive; it owes its significance to the describer, who is describing for some reason. Consider the phrase, the gestalt of university life. That's a description, no doubt useful. Accurate? Thinking almost at a zero level of discernment, we might say yes, it describes something. Think a little more and we might recognize that what it describes is its own creation - it's an idea, held by the person who has it. And a little more, we might recognize that at a more granular level, there is no such thing(-in-itself) as university life. Is gestalt useful as a description? Perhaps. Does it do more harm than good, or good than harm? That depends on usage.

Or, your teen-age daughter whines bitterly, "But daddy, everybody does it!" Now there's gestalt in action! Are you impressed? And you answer, "Of course not, because everybody does not do it!" This imaginary conversation is intended to illustrate the potential harm in reifying ideas - and incidentally how contentious correcting the error can be.

You seem to want to carry these words (motive, purpose, telos, gestalt) and however many similar words and the ideas they represent down into the grain of the thing. The thing, plant, animal, engine, painting, is just a thing. The miracle of thinking is that we can think about these things. But our thoughts are no part of them.

Or it may be that it's part of a constellation of presuppositions you make about the world. If that's the case, my crying foul would seem to you so much nonsense, because your presuppositions in this case are axiomatic for you - and axioms are never wrong, they're just axioms, until they cease to be axioms and become mere propositions, which can be wrong. Which is to say that maybe your axiom is my proposition - a condition that always leads to problems until the tension between the two is broken.

In saying all this I realize I'm passing a razor across the underbelly of substantial psychology method. Psychologists have and do make a living having ideas and then representing them as real. Can you say ego, id, super-ego? Ideas of some utility, but not real.

Since the issue of final causes, i.e. teleology, won’t go anywhere prior to resolving the basic issue of what is doing the responding to stimuli, — javra

In a tree, cells. I say that because I believe that's what a tree is, a collection of plant cells. And that communication must be cell-to-cell - as you point out, there is no central nervous system.

Just to be clear, I don't mind words like motive, purpose, telos, gestalt used in their proper arena. I do mind when they jump the fence and infect other thinking, where they shouldn't be.

I burned my hand this morning under some hot water. My hand moved involuntarily. Later, when my toast was done, I had a choice between raspberry and blueberry jam; I chose both. The hand movement I call immediate, unmediated. The behaviour of choosing which jam, mediated.

Perhaps another way. The immediate action just happens, it couldn't be any other way. The mediate action represents a decision, and the action could have been this or that. — tim wood

Yet this does not address my question of which causal mechanisms are at work. But be this as it may.

So now we’re at the apparent impasse of what life is in general. I presented this summation:

Life is a gestalt process. Any portion of the physical substrata which serves as a constituent of the gestalt process of life will be dead or dying when isolated from its interactions with all other material subcomponents from which life emerges as a gestalt process. — javra

And instead of having this proposition regarding the existential reality at hand—that of life—replied to, you provide examples regarding human thoughts so as to evidence that gestalts are strictly products of human cognition and imagination.

I’m not, for example, addressing the concept of a table as something which is other than the sum of its conceptual parts. I’m addressing the ontic reality of life as being something that is other than the sum of its ontic parts. This too is in keeping with the definition of gestalts, which are forms (the second definition on Wiktionary) And no, to me this is not axiomatic; it is, as you say, a conclusion obtained from discernments of what is.

(BTW, other terms and positions could be used to address this same conclusion, such as holons and the position of holism; but by now I presume so doing would only needlessly complicate matters.)

You maintain that a human’s life (this being a very applicable example of a life) is not an ontically gestalt process—is not a process which is other than the sum of its parts. These following four questions might help me to better understand your worldview:

1) Is a human’s life then nothing but a product of human cognition and imagination, holding no ontic reality of its own (other than as an abstract human thought)?

2) If no, is a human’s life in your opinion then present strictly within parts of the human body—such as, for example, strictly in the body’s individual cells?

3) If no, is there an ontic distinction between a humans’ life and the same human’s total but dead corpse—this even when many of the given body’s individual cells are yet living?

4) If yes, what is the ontic distinction in your opinion between a human’s life and the same human’s life-devoid body—if not that of the human’s life being a gestalt process which vanishes when the processes of its physical substratum no longer interact in a certain way (decomposition too is a process of the physical organic substratum)?

I don’t know how these questions will come across, but our worldviews now appear too far apart for me to presume what your answers to any of these questions might be. I’d usually take it that we could agree that a human’s life cannot be dissected with a scalpel nor placed into a jar—but I’m no longer certain of even this.