Is there only one Designer of life or are their multiple designers? Here is James Shapiro’s take: Bacteria are small but not stupid:
Cognition, natural genetic engineering, and sociobacteriology
Bacteria as natural genetic engineers….
This remarkable series of observations requires us to revise basic ideas about biological information processing and recognize that even the smallest cells are sentient beings.
In the case of engineered products we often might think of designers (plural) versus a designer (singular). It may be that some Ultimate Intelligence created the universe and (by way of extension) engineers. But even for those of us who accept that there is an Ultimate Intelligence, it is not customary to say that God made automobiles and airplanes and genetically engineered food.
Can we find proximal sources of intelligent design of life without appealing directly to the Ultimate Intelligence? Even though I personally believe God was the Ultimate Creator of the universe and hence even the creator of the Wright Brothers, I generally still identify airplanes as the proximal intelligent design of the Wright Brothers. A similar issue may arise in identifying the Designer or designers of life on Earth.
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