subanima

Well, many people would simply disagree with you about what questions they want to think about and find compelling.

E.g. https://www.biologicalpurpose.org/

or

https://www.expandingpossibilities.org/

What are your thoughts then on “plant grow roots to get water”?

"It is not even close to being a problem"

This is not true. Teleology is one of the most controversial concepts in biology and many are very scared of it. I was trying to target those with these deep seated fears when asking those rhetorical questions.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/teleology-biology/

All biologists interested in agency are keenly aware of Templeton's religious slant. Unfortunately we live under capitalism and scientists have to get paid from somewhere. Most standard funding bodies are not willing to fund agency research as teleology is seen to be deeply unscientific.

Johannes Jaeger is one such researcher in this area who has written a blog post about this concern: http://www.johannesjaeger.eu/blog/pushing-the-boundaries

Quote from the article:

"I've been trying to get my research into organismic agency funded by public funders for years now, without the slightest chance of success. The project is heavily transdisciplinary, trying to redefine how scientists see evolving spaces of the possible, expanding our view of what is a valid scientific explanation beyond strict mechanicism (yet still rigorous and naturalistic), challenging our mechanistic view of organismic behavior and biological evolution, while attempting the impossible task of simulating a whole cell or organism (see below). No panel at any funding body other than Templeton was open minded enough or could muster the transdisciplinary expertise to judge such a project properly and fairly. Also: gatekeepers will be gatekeeping, especially in committees set up by public funders. Templeton offers me a unique opportunity to escape these problematic institutional constraints. Whatever their motives to do this, this project is almost sure to drastically reduce the space for supernatural mysticism in biology rather than justify it in any way."

The intended medium is the video at the top of the page. The page itself is just a way for me to show all my sources clearly. See this link which I also posted below for details on the mechanism of genetic assimilation: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12551-018-0403-x

As I said in the video, the hypothesis for the finches is unproven. I simply wanted to show an interesting alternative theory that throws up some interesting questions.

Genetic assimilation is a concept that has been well confirmed and is not really controversial among biologists:

https://doi.org/10.1111/evo.12348

If you're concerned about a mechanism, then here are more details which were too complex to put in the video, but in retrospect with many people dubious, I should have indeed provided a more in depth explanation:

https://doi.org/10.1007/s12551-018-0403-x

I got my biology education at the University of Melbourne if that's an unimaginably bad institution to you. Many many biologists and philosophers are very interested in biological agency as a phenomena, discussed in this review here:

https://www.templeton.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Biologi...

For names, google Evan Thompson, Philip Ball, Kevin Mitchell, Lynn Chiu, Stuart Kauffman. Are they all idiots too?