@wayne,
wayne wrote:
What do you think it is, that you call thought?
It is the processing and organizing of information.
The information exists apart from ourselves, we aquire info, we are not the beginning of said info.
All living creatures do the same thing, humans just have a greater capacity for info than dogs.
As fil pointed out, even rocks change the organization of info, or have you never sat in the shade.
I'm sorry, are you trying to claim that rocks think? I am going to assume that this is not what you are trying to say, because it is clearly absurd. Rocks causally interact with their environment, as all physical objects do, they do not think. I, too, causally interact with my environment, but my interaction with my environment isn't
merely causal. When I see a tree before me I am likely to form a belief along the lines of "there is a tree", and certainly, the act of seeing involves the causal impingement of my environment on my sensory faculties, but I also need to have conceptual capacities if I am to judge or think at all. If I haven't been taught about trees, physical objects, or the many other concepts required to make sense of the world around me, what is going to happen when there is a tree in front of me? Clearly I cannot form the belief "There is a tree".
No doubt I would 'see' in some kind of crude animal-like manner, but that could only mean that I would be sensitive to changes in light or retinal stimulation. As a human who has mastery of a repertoire of concepts, however, when I look around the room I see
that there is a bookshelf, I see
that there is a computer, I see
that the door is open, and this can undoubtedly be called taking in information about my environment. However, if my dog were sitting next to me he would not be able to see that there is a bookshelf in the corner, because he does not have the requisite concepts. Dogs cannot think because they do not have the concepts that we employ in thought.
I also think you need to think about the way you are using the word 'information'. Here are some things I would count as information:
Barrack Obama is the President of the United States.
Grass is green.
My shoes are made from leather.
I live in England.
Notice that all of the above make use of concepts. What on earth would count as a piece of information that did not make use of concepts? An image? Without concepts what would it be an image of? Information that isn't conceptually structured isn't information at all. This is, of course, one of Kant's most important insights: "intuitions without concepts are blind". Indeed, it isn't even enough that concepts must be made use of. "Rain green sleepless" and "milk me sugar" do not count as information, they are nonsensical babbling. Information must also be propositional.
