The consciouness paradox

There have been an estimate of about 5 million to 100 million species on this planet...Greatest Mysteries: How Many Species Exist on Earth? | Live Science...is it really that impressive that 1 happens to have consciousness?It was bound to happen once evolution began to take place.There is nothing special about our genetic make up, it is basically the same as all other species. Our genetic arrangement happens to evolve into a conscious being. I have 4 words for it...yeah, and, so what?Edited by onifre, : correction on data

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

I don't see how the luck of an evolutionary draw makes us special, IMO.Lottery winners are not special, they got lucky, as did we. One massive climate change in the enviroment before the common ancestor split and none of this would be happening.Brain growth developed a primate that became wise due to necessity. And, like your wiki link stated, "Displays sound judgment in a complex, dynamic environment". I would like to see that argument. I really don't think any other species are conscious of themselves or of their future. I guess the first step would be to establish a definition for consciousness and go from there.If we define consciousness as the recognition of ones self then I doubt much evidence will be presented for other species having this ability...but i've been corrected many times on this forum so im sure I'll be corrected again

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

But intelligence isn't special, its the result of randomness. Its special for us but how great has it been for our enviroment? Not many things on this planet have benefited from our rise to intelligence other than us, so it seems rather self-centered to say that we are special. We are just another species. How did he/she become filthy rich though? Granted they are NOW special, but he/she wasn't special before the lucky draw of the numbers. I wasn't aware of such a test, thanks for the link. Im going to read up on it some more. I did read in the link that there is some skepticism about those results actually meaning 'self-awareness', but it does make sense that most of the 'aware' animals were Great Apes and Dolphins.

Dr you just blew my mind...

So a chart created by humans to test other species' intelligence tells us that we are the smartest, hmmm, that test seems fuckin bias... Im sure Al Gore would love to Ok, if wings were evolved for a purpose and/or neccesity, and intelligence was evolved for a purpose and/or neccesity, then what makes one more special than the other? The way you are presenting it seems to mean intelligence was a gift of some kind that merits a hierarchy in evolved traits. It's just a trait, it was useful and was selected.If we were making a chart for the ability to fly naturally we'd be shit. How about a chart for swimming under water, we would suck. So it only depends on what you think is the greatest evolved trait of all time, or is that even fair to do since traits are adaptations that are dictated by the enviromental conditions each species finds itself in? I go with the latter. What if money became of no value? Then you'd just have a 1000 things to wipe your ass with...now is that really special?(I'll let you finish the punchline on that one) This I cannot argue, you are correct, we are the shit when it comes to shit talking

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

Sure, within intelligent species we are clearly the most intelligent but the means by which we became intelligent was nothing short of luck. To me this would imply that intelligence, even though it is a great trait to posses, isn't special. It was also dependant upon many factors to get us to this level of intelligence, factors that were outside of our control. I could see your point if we originally worked toward more intelligence, but we really didn't, we became intelligent because of evolvement and now we bask in its glory...lucky us. The 2 are dependent upon other factors, and each other. IMO, both of those traits were the result of something which caused those traits, so they aren't independently special, or placed in a hierarchy, they are just traits. To me this would suggest that the species who don't have echo-location didn't evolve it for a reason. Why would a mammal have such a trait if that trait wasn't benefitial to that mammal? Why do species have specific traits to begin with? Isn't it simply for necessity?The question I would have would be,
At the molecular level, is echolocation any more complex than sexual reproduction?At that point I could see it being in a hierarchy, if it is more complex, like single-cell organisms vs. multi-celled organisms. But it would just be a hierarchy that we made up for the purpose of giving value to a natural phenomena. Right, but if we could I believe they would say 'what is hierarchy?', which is basically what im saying.There is no hierarchy. We are all equally advantageous to our enviroment. Each trait is unique, none better than the other because they are not independent of their surroundings.To go back to the OP, consciousness is cool, but its not 'more special' than flight, or echolocation, or night vision etc...I know you argued earlier in the thread for sapience being the actual special trait, and its hard to argue against that but, I think thats only through our perspective that we see it as special. Edited by onifre, : No reason given.

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

What would convince you? Ok, I can agree with that. But aren't we going with the premise that life occured naturally? If it did then I win Well you are pointing to 2 different time periods. One of early life with not much diversity, then one millions of years later with lots of diversity. It seems unfair to compare the 2. Its expected to see alot more diversity millions of years later were the common traits would be minimal. Sure, but what fault is it of the lesser adapted species? And the fact that it hasn't become extinct due to natural causes is a sign that the species is a survivor. But, my point was that species don't control the traits they evolve, the traits they have are based off of enviromental pressure, therefore none, IMO, merits a hierarchy. But, only in the POV of the person with consciousness, in the whole scope of traits consciousness has not been anymore advantagous for us than wings have been for birds.

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

Ugh, you and your proper english...How about just 'luck'? I would have to see evidence to the contrary but, sure it 'might' be outside the ToE...it might, just might, be designed too. Absolutly, it would still be completely natural...but, wait, how did the Aliens get so intelligent? Maybe, just maybe... Agreed Ok, I can definitly concede on that statement. The level of intelligence that we possess is quite impressive. If that equals the possibility of 'something else' at work, then I can't argue a possibility.Good talk CS, always fun to jab with you

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"All great truths begin as blasphemies""I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky