An aside: the Venus fly trap plant has fibers in its hinged petals. Touching one will not close it. Touching more than one with a delay between touches will not close it. Touching one or more fibers in succession will close it. This plant moves as if it can count and is aware of time. Learning that caused me to re-think what it means to count, as did your essay. Except the plant-fact is interesting while your essay is useful.
Plants do not count and have no awareness of time or of anything at all. The exact method by which venus fly traps activate is unknown but it seems hard to me to attribute it with the ability to count. That kind of teleological explanation is something we are cognitively biased to give but it fails to be explanatory.
Sunflowers do not turn their heads to face the sun because they want to catch more sunlight. They turn towards light because those cells that are in shadow receive more auxin which in turn stimulates the elongation of the cell walls causing the plant to grow in the opposite direction and towards the light. Natural selection will tend to favor those individuals that can gather more light than those which do not. There is no teleology involved.
Where are you seeing any teleology? Counting is just switching to a different state whenever a thing happens and performing a certain behavior when a certain state is reached. Time-sensitive behavior is… basically ubiquitous. (Yeah, yeah, “awareness” was a poor word choice.) You can buy counters and clocks at the electronics store! They don’t require any mysterious ghost of anthropomorphism!
Please allow me to clarify. “This plant moves as if it can count and is aware of time.” We are in agreement that the plant is not aware, and I was careful to say so. “Learning that caused me to re-think what it means to count, as did your essay. Except the plant-fact is interesting while your essay is useful.” Hearing a random song on the radio can spark a thought, but it doesn’t mean I’m thinking about that song. That’s what I mean by an interesting re-think. The essay I praise is something I’m thinking about. That’s what I mean by a useful re-think.
Clear writing, clear thinking, much appreciated.
An aside: the Venus fly trap plant has fibers in its hinged petals. Touching one will not close it. Touching more than one with a delay between touches will not close it. Touching one or more fibers in succession will close it. This plant moves as if it can count and is aware of time. Learning that caused me to re-think what it means to count, as did your essay. Except the plant-fact is interesting while your essay is useful.
Plants do not count and have no awareness of time or of anything at all. The exact method by which venus fly traps activate is unknown but it seems hard to me to attribute it with the ability to count. That kind of teleological explanation is something we are cognitively biased to give but it fails to be explanatory.
Sunflowers do not turn their heads to face the sun because they want to catch more sunlight. They turn towards light because those cells that are in shadow receive more auxin which in turn stimulates the elongation of the cell walls causing the plant to grow in the opposite direction and towards the light. Natural selection will tend to favor those individuals that can gather more light than those which do not. There is no teleology involved.
Where are you seeing any teleology? Counting is just switching to a different state whenever a thing happens and performing a certain behavior when a certain state is reached. Time-sensitive behavior is… basically ubiquitous. (Yeah, yeah, “awareness” was a poor word choice.) You can buy counters and clocks at the electronics store! They don’t require any mysterious ghost of anthropomorphism!
Please allow me to clarify. “This plant moves as if it can count and is aware of time.” We are in agreement that the plant is not aware, and I was careful to say so. “Learning that caused me to re-think what it means to count, as did your essay. Except the plant-fact is interesting while your essay is useful.” Hearing a random song on the radio can spark a thought, but it doesn’t mean I’m thinking about that song. That’s what I mean by an interesting re-think. The essay I praise is something I’m thinking about. That’s what I mean by a useful re-think.