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From: rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: To my good ole buddy Rich Rosen!
Message-ID: <1290@bbncca.ARPA>
Date: Mon, 28-Jan-85 12:44:35 EST
Article-I.D.: bbncca.1290
Posted: Mon Jan 28 12:44:35 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 30-Jan-85 06:33:03 EST
References: <2523@mcnc.UUCP>
Organization: Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, Ma.
Lines: 20

Even if the perceived pattern is real (& can be shown to be), this
doesn't necessarily imply Purpose, or any particular purpose (it's
much easier to describe than to explain via ideas of cause or function;
yet a cause or function is not the same as a purpose, which is more). 
For example, how you get "purpose" out of big-bang cosmology?

The words "design" & "purpose" themselves tend to have the idea of
"intelligence" packed into them.

If computers can one day be said to possess intelligence, then
does intelligence imply personality?  What do animal brains do?
Probably not all of them possess "intelligence", i.e, human cog-
nitive processes, in anything like the sense we mean it, yet it's
not implausible to say that these animals have "personality".

In short, the connections in the chain "design/purpose->intelligence->
personality" are assumptions, particular philosophical beliefs, and
not logical or self-evident links.

					Ron Rizzo