If we're going to start somewhere, I suspect it's not processes in human beings - that's a way down the road. The starting point is my awareness.
— bert1

That makes sense. Now I guess you're going to show us how what we experience as awareness can be observed in rocks. — T Clark

What birds experience as flight cannot be observed in a rock. But the properties of subatomic particles that give rise to flight in birds are present in the subatomic particles that make up rocks. Centuries ago, people might’ve assumed rocks and birds are made of different things. We know better.

if the properties of subatomic particles we are aware of cannot explain consciousness, then perhaps unknown properties are present. And a rock is made up of the same subatomic particles that we are.

What are we going to look for as evidence of consciousness in (a) a rock, and (b) a human? — bert1

When we are looking for evidence for the existence of something --animate or inanimate-- we are looking for the presence of special characteristics attributed to that something, i.e. elements that would indicate the existence or occurrence of that something. E.g. in the case of a murder that you mentioned, such elements would be a dead body, fingerprints, etc. The case of consciousness, however, is much more complicated because here we have to deal with a concept, an abstract idea, compared to a much more concrete case, which is murder. Yet, in both cases, the characteristics, the elements we are to look for are part of the definition of the subject in question: what is murder and what is consciousness, resp/ly.
If we don’t know the meaning of them, looking for evidence about them has no meaning either, right?

So, since you have not offered such a definition --I believe you should-- I will have to assume at least a simple definition of consciousness, which is, a state and ability to perceive things in the immediate surroundings and --for human beings-- within ourselves. But let's ignore the second one, in order to make things simpler and more direct.

So, I know for myself that I am conscious because we I can perceive things in the environment. OK, but how do I know that the other person next to me is also conscious? First of all, what applies to me as far as consciousness is concerned, applies to that person too, since he (for brevity) is also a human being. But we can go further and observe that he reacts to the surroundings. To do that he must be able to perceive, that. is to be conscious.

This applies not only to humans but to every form of life, i.e. to life in general. Even plants can perceive. (Yes, they do! :smile:)

So, the evidence that we must look for regarding consciousness --i.e. whether something is conscious or not-- is signs of perception and by extension reactions to the environment.

Now, can we obtain such evidence, i.e. observe such signs in objects, like a rock? Can we establish that a rock perceives ans reacts to the environment?

I'm leaving the answer to you. :smile:

Is consciousness more than the perception and response of an archaea, or the automatic door at the supermarket? Some will say not; that it is much more complex, due to many feedback loops, but is entirely mechanical.

Is consciousness more than the perception and response of an archaea, or the automatic door at the supermarket? Some will say not; that it is much more complex, due to many feedback loops, but is entirely mechanical. — Patterner

Consciousness is more than just perception --and much more complex, as you say-- but his is something outside this thread. Perception, IMO, is a very basic characteristic of it and using it is the best way to describe it for the purposes of most discussions in here.
And there are indeed kind of "feedback loops" as you say, more of which are --or at least seem-- automatic, mechanical. But these interactions are happening by and are due to the mind (esp. thinking). And there of course biological reactions to thoughts and vice versa. But the mind has also a regulator role. With it we can control these "feedback loops" to a greater or lesser degree. And this needs not to be mechanical. Free will is not something mechanical. Conscious and voluntary actions are not mechanical.

And, of course, consciousness is far from being something mechanical. To be mechanical, something must operate. Consciousness is only a witness, an observer of these reactions and the whole processes involving these reactions. Consciousness does not act. It does not even feel. It's just what we are perceiving and experiencing. We are aware of what is happening outside and inside us. That's all.

I'm sorry, I don't understand. If we observe reactions to the surroundings, which also prove perception of the surroundings, how do we know there is consciousness, as opposed to the simple stimulus and response that we can find in any number of mechanical devices?

f we observe reactions to the surroundings, which also prove perception of the surroundings, how do we know there is consciousness, as opposed to the simple stimulus and response that we can find in any number of mechanical devices? — Patterner

Good question. I don't know! :grin:
But biologists know. Here's something interesting that I have brought in recently in another discussion, showing that even plants are endowed with the faculty of perception:

"Plants perceive the stimuli of the environment (rain, wind, cold, heat, attacks from herbivores or pathogens, and so on) and remember for a sufficiently long period, not these stimuli as such but rather the type of reaction they should have. This capacity is a precious asset enabling plants to produce a response adapted to all these stimuli and their fluctuations. If a plant perceives a stimulus to which it has previously been subjected, its response will be stronger."
(Sensory properties, memory and communication in the plant world)

The key word is "perception". There are things that work on a stimulus-response mechanism but they themsleves can't perceive and thus they have no consciousness. One of these our brain. Our brain does not percieve. It just receives and transmits signals. It is us --as living organisms-- who perceive. The brain only help us, e.g. to use our vision to see something. And we can only do that if we are conscious.

What birds experience as flight cannot be observed in a rock. But the properties of subatomic particles that give rise to flight in birds are present in the subatomic particles that make up rocks. Centuries ago, people might’ve assumed rocks and birds are made of different things. We know better.

if the properties of subatomic particles we are aware of cannot explain consciousness, then perhaps unknown properties are present. And a rock is made up of the same subatomic particles that we are. — Patterner

It seems like I'm always responding to you in particular, Patterner. I hope it doesn't seem like I'm picking on you. I guess you just say things in ways that get me thinking.

Anyway, a key difference between a bird and some rock we might suppose contains the same chemical elements in the same proportions as the bird, is the way those chemical elements are situated with respect to each other.

So it is not a matter of unknown physical properties making the difference. It is a matter of how the various elements are situated in molecule, how those molecules are situated in cells, how some cells are situated in muscles and brains, etc...

The difference in arrangement of the components makes a difference, and no new physics is needed to understand this.

Edit: I should have started with the fact that, how the subatomic particles are situated with respect to each other to form chemical elements is another part of the scientific picture, in order to address what you said.

Oh it's a disaster for panpsychism! — bert1

In a previous answer to one of my posts you wrote:

Not being a panpsychist, looking for consciousness in inanimate objects is not something I would normally do, but since you brought it up... It seems clear to me the idea of consciousness originated to refer to a human mental process.
— T Clark

Maybe, but even that sentence is theory-laden. It's stipulating it's a process. And I'm doubtful that earliest thinkers about consciousness did necessarily restrict it to human beings. If we're going to start somewhere, I suspect it's not processes in human beings - that's a way down the road. The starting point is my awareness. — bert1

As I replied to that comment, I think you were right. The only way you can sell panpsychism is to look at it from the starting point of your awareness. Reading your responses to other people's comments in subsequent posts, it seems like you haven't followed up on that insight. The comments you are responding to are "theory-laden," but you haven't really tried to sell the self-awareness aspect. Or did I miss something?

I'd like to hear you try to make a chain of inferences from your personal self-awareness to awareness in rocks.

As an afterthought - As I see it, panpsychism is a metaphysical concept. There is no way it can be tested empirically. It's more a way of thinking about things, a point of view, than it is a statement of fact. So... why would I do that? What value or insight do I get from thinking of consciousness the way you propose? This is a serious question, no irony intended.

It seems like I'm always responding to you in particular, Patterner. I hope it doesn't seem like I'm picking on you. I guess you just say things in ways that get me thinking. — wonderer1

:D No worries!

The difference in arrangement of the components makes a difference, and no new physics is needed to understand that. — wonderer1

I understand what you're saying, but I don't agree. It's fine when we're talking about a physical process like flight. Physical properties of particles can build physical structures; which can interact in physical ways with other physical structures; on and on - all giving us the physical process of flight. All of the components of a rock are not arranged correctly to give it flight.

The same can be said about the functions of our bodies and brains. Particles build structures. Retina, neurons, whatever the heck the current theory of how memories are stored is, muscles, etc. Photon hits retina, signal travels via optic nerve to brain, memories are triggered, responses geared toward safety and health come out on top after all pros and cons are weighed against each other, action potentials to bting about something safe and healthy are initiated, we move in whatever way came out on top. Stimulus and response.

All of that is physical. An incredibly complex web of physical things and processes, but physical. But it is accompanied by subjective experience and awareness. Why is that? All of the physical processes would take place without our awareness of, and feelings for, them, would they not? Photon would hit retinal, signal would travel up optic nerve, etc. If it’s all just physical interactions, they are going to happen, regardless of our awareness of them. So what point that awareness? Why should we have preferences and feelings about anything if they are going to play out as they do because they are just physical interactions?

But that's just an aside. My real problem is that physical processes don't feel happy or sad, and don't contemplate concepts. Those things happen because of our recognition of patterns in the physical processes. If it's just the laws of physics, then the laws of physics built the Great Wall of China and constructed computers, wrote The Malazan Book of the Fallen and the Heileger Dankgesang, and are planning a colony on Mars. Laws of physics don't do such things. Without consciousness, those things wouldn't exist. There's something not laws of physics at work. But how did it come to be?

When folk hereabouts think rocks conscious, evidence is extraneous.

Laugh and walk away.

I think the same way about brain consciousness.

In short, we would need to arrive at a minimum criterion for what counts as consciousness, such that any and all candidates under consideration which meet that minimum criterion could be sensibly called "conscious"...
— creativesoul

...So we need a definition, or theory, to guide what we are looking for. And then the stuff we find when looking constitutes evidence. Is that right? — bert1

Yes, but I want to be on record as stating that it's a nuanced affirmation, to put it very mildly.

"Consciousness" is a concept/notion/idea/name/tool that, depending on the user, may or may not be being used in order to pick out something(s) to the exclusion of all else.

I would think that prior to looking for something one would need to be able to know what they're looking for. Consciousness, however, is a term that is fraught with all sorts of issues and confusion, not the least of which is the utter lack of clear and concise delineation/definition/identity. Hence, I tend to think it best if a slightly different tack is taken. It seems to me that consciousness is what we've historically attributed to creatures capable of having meaningful experience(s). This is one way of beginning to delineate the scope.

If all creatures capable of having meaningful experiences count as conscious creatures, then if we can glean knowledge regarding what counts as having meaningful experience, and more importantly, what it takes in order to have them, then we can glean knowledge about what it takes in order to be and or become a conscious creature in the relevant sense.

However, it becomes readily apparent that the entire project will hinge directly upon a bare minimum criterion regarding what exactly counts as having a meaningful experience.

So to take your "The ability to draw meaningful correlations between different things," I think is your definition/concept/theory of consciousness. And then if something, say ChatGPT, appears to draw meaningful correlations between things, then that is evidence that it is conscious. Am I following you? — bert1

Drawing meaningful correlations is not the same thing as appearing to. Yes, the ability to draw meaningful correlations between different things amounts to one step on the reductive ladder towards the bare minimum(irreducible) criterion regarding what it takes to have meaningful experiences, and thus what it takes in order to be conscious in the relevant sense of the term.

There's a bit more reduction to go...

Thank you for trying to tackle the question directly. — bert1

You're welcome, but there's no need to thank me. I'm just like that.

Interested in why you strongly disagree with consciousness being a cluster concept. There seem to be a lot of types of conscious states that have radically different qualities, but we'd call all of them conscious. That to me connotes approaching the idea as a fuzzy unity of overlapping things, which can be disambiguated as needed based on the context. In my mind that's a cluster concept. — fdrake

It would be a cluster concept if none of those 'types of conscious states' had one essential defining feature. But they do. They're all phenomenally conscious in the sense that there's something it is like to be in them. That said, if one of them doesn't have the the feature of phenomenal consciousness (say, a robot (or zombie or whatever) creating a model of the world it can use to make predictions 'in the dark'), then it's not a conscious state in that sense. Phenomenal consciousness picks out exactly one feature/property and one feature only, the presence of which is essential to the definition. That sense of 'consciousness' isn't a cluster concept.

If pressed, the best I can say is there is thinking. — Tom Storm

Identity aside, we can be sure that there is consciousness. I don't particularly like Descartes' formulation.

Common sense - which may be more useful than philosophy - tells me I am conscious. But so what? — Tom Storm

It's a datum that must be accounted for in any complete worldview. Hence the hard problem. How do we fit it in? Can we start with structure and function and get consciousness out of that? If not, what do we do? Do we have to add it into the starting conditions? That's typically the panpsychist position.

If there is evidence for anything, it is evident to someone who is conscious. Therefore, all and any evidence is evidence of consciousness.

This will not satisfy, because you do not want evidence of your consciousness, but of mine. But then you are trying to make my subjectivity objective, and visible to you, which would be to deprive me of my consciousness and make it yours. Don't be so greedy. :razz:

:D

I'm just going to answer in terms of (what I understand of) Metzinger's approach, since it is amenable to me and is materialist while taking phenomenal selfhood seriously.

It would be a cluster concept if none of those 'types of conscious states' had one essential defining feature. But they do. They're all phenomenally conscious in the sense that there's something it is like to be in them. — bert1

To my knowledge, Metzinger disagrees with the inference you just made. Specifically he claims that there can be "core components" of phenomenal selfhood and phenomenal experience which are universally shared, but nevertheless the concept is a cluster concept. That universal aspect of phenomenal selfhood he calls "minimal phenomenal selfhood", and the universal aspect of experience is "minimal phenomenal experience".

With those terms in place, I think he also strongly disagrees with the claim that "minimal phenomenal selfhood" and "minimal phenomenal experience" contain anything like what qualists intend by "what is it like" states.

That said, if one of them doesn't have the the feature of phenomenal consciousness (say, a robot (or zombie or whatever) creating a model of the world it can use to make predictions 'in the dark'), then it's not a conscious state in that sense. Phenomenal consciousness picks out exactly one feature/property and one feature only, the presence of which is essential to the definition. That sense of 'consciousness' isn't a cluster concept.

I believe there's a connotation in there, in contrasting phenomenal consciousness (in humans) to an absence of phenomenal consciousness (in robots), it construes consciousness as a binary property - on or off. Which might be true for Metzinger, but only for minimal phenomenal experience/selfhood - if someone is said to have experience or selfhood at all, they will have minimal phenomenal experience/selfhood (definitionally). The content and structure of such a state is left unanalysed (so far in this thread at least) save for the assertion that it consists of "what is it like" states, or even a general impression of "what is it like" over state-aggregates in a unified phenomenal experience (to be disambiguated).

The "rub" of making these distinctions is that what a qualist may construe as a definitive of phenomenal experience/selfhood may turn out to be too much - in that it contains unnecessary structures or types of content. How "what is it like" relevant states are construed by intersect with that non-necessary content. Those structures of experience that come with qualia that do not come with minimal phenomenal experiences.

Metzinger's account of minimal phenomenal experience (MPE) extracts 6 constraints that phenomenal experience must satisfy.

Wakefulness) The phenomenal character of tonic alertness (see section 3.1).


Low Complexity) often described as the complete absence of intentional content, in particular of high-level symbolic mental content (i.e., discursive, conceptual, or propositional thought), but also of sensorimotor or affective content

Self-luminosity): a phenomenal property instantiated during some MPE episodes, typically described as “radiance”, “brilliance”, or the “clear light” of primordial awareness.
Introspective availability) We can sometimes actively direct introspective attention to consciousness as such and we can distinguish possible states by the degree of actually ongoing access.

Epistemicity) The phenomenal experience of knowing, which comes in degrees and can also be described as the subjective quality of confidence

Transparency/Opacity) Like all other phenomenal representations, MPE can vary along a spectrum of opacity and transparency


Broadly construed, this is "awareness of awareness" without "awareness of the individuated content of awareness". In that state, the body's self-modelling processes which normally would intend, judge, see red apples, and be aware that "I" need to eat breakfast don't occur. Awareness without the cognitive retrojection of objects and a self identifying perspective subsuming them. That does not resemble anything like qualia, does it? There's little room for an embodied, self aware agent with mind states directed towards objects' properties in that construal. At least in the way qualists contend.

Which isn't to say the kind of states that qualists think of are impossible, just that those states perhaps aren't the essential characteristics of consciousness. Insofar as one can have phenomenal experience without anything resembling a quale (as often construed).

At the very least, I think Metzinger's efforts put the ball in qualists' courts for trying to show that those states are irreducible and primitive. In particular he suggests the following list that characterises "minimal phenomenal experience'

Paper here.

And if we're looking for evidence of such a thing - I think my list covers the bases. Though it isn't tailored to discriminate each facet individually.

Many thanks fdrake. That looks like a very interesting paper. I'll process it and reply. Hopefully soon.

If there is evidence for anything, it is evident to someone who is conscious. Therefore, all and any evidence is evidence of consciousness. — unenlightened

Absolutely. All thinking is autological in this sense.

Have you checked out any of Thomas Metzinger's work on classifying awarenesses (also Wayfarer , you'd probably get something out of his "neuro-Buddhism") — fdrake

I'm generally well-disposed to Metzinger (and Damasio and Christof Koch) - he seems a congenial spirit and quite a sound analyst, but I find coming up to speed on his science seems hardly worth the effort when you actually get to the philosophical kernel. It's like he's trying to package some worthwhile insights in such a way as to gain ground with a scientistic audience. I've downloaded the Being No-one Précis, I'll try and devote a bit more time to it.

the properties of subatomic particles that give rise to flight in birds are present in the subatomic particles that make up rocks — Patterner

However, such bare reductionism presents no credible account of the higher-level factors that come into play in the organic domain. You could never deduce from the examination of fundamental particles the principles of organic chemistry, let alone evolutionary biology. Furthermore as you're no doubt aware physics itself nowadays seems to implicate the higher-level (and non-reducible) role of the observer.

What are we going to look for as evidence of consciousness in (a) a rock, and (b) a human? — bert1

As an empirical question, it's rather ridiculous but I suppose as a thought-experiment it might be useful. I think fdrake covers it pretty well however I would question the following as question-begging:

there needs to be some part of its material constitution that has representational capacity. — fdrake

This assumes that the 'representational capacity' is indeed part of its 'material constitution', when it is the nature of representational capacity, and whether this can be explained in terms of material constitution, which is at issue!

The most fundamental unit of consciousness is a reflection of the outside from on the inside, and vice versa. There is an " in here" and an "out there". — Watchmaker

:up:

This assumes that the 'representational capacity' is indeed part of its 'material constitution', when it is the nature of representational capacity, and whether this can be explained in terms of material constitution, which is at issue! — Wayfarer

I hadn't meant "material constitution" in a substantial sense. Just something the thing does. Like walking. Do you think it would be evidence for consciousness (something like a sufficient condition), even if it doesn't behave like a screen (something like a necessary condition)?

I hadn't meant "material constitution" in a substantial sense. Just something the thing does. Like walking. — fdrake

Which is basically behaviourism. 'We can't say what is going on inside the thing, but we can report on what it does'. But I suppose in terms of the way the question has been posed (as distinct from the much blurrier question of 'what *is* consciousness?') then your answer does hit the mark.

Right. That's pretty much the conclusion I came to, I think. So we need a definition, or theory, to guide what we are looking for. And then the stuff we find when looking constitutes evidence. Is that right? — bert1

One challenge for a theory about rock consciousness is that it would conflict with our present worldview. That means it would stretch the meanings of words. A theory of that type wouldn't be taken seriously until society in general has shifted ideologically.

I hadn't meant "material constitution" in a substantial sense. Just something the thing does. Like walking. Do you think it would be evidence for consciousness (something like a sufficient condition), even if it doesn't behave like a screen (something like a necessary condition)? — fdrake

Metzinger is another who naively accepts the framing of consciousness as the problem of a self in the world. There is this phenomenological “stuff” - the Cartesian res cogitans. And this other noumenal stuff of the res extensa, the realm of physical being.

So we walk - which is somehow on the side of physics and merely the physiological behaviour. And then at some level - usually quite subconscious unless we stumble - there is the phenomenology that seems painted on a passively representing mental screen.

An antique and dualist metaphysics is baked into the discussion by classing the mind and world as relata rather than as itself a pragmatic relation.

In practice, the neurobiology of self is all about making a running self-world distinction. What we are conscious of is being this thing of what we call “a self in its world”, or an Umwelt.

So there is no self, and there is no world. These are modelling constructs. What there is instead is a running habit of discrimination where we are continually dividing our phenomenal existence along those lines. At every scale of biological and neurological being, from metabolism, to immunology, to feet acting on ground, we are having to decide what is self, what is other.

The feeling of running a rocky trail is one of complete world mastery - it is all me as every footstep makes nimble snug ownership of the hollows and angles of the track, until it isn’t and I get the aggrieved realisation that a chunk of stone has leapt out to catch at my toe with animistic aggression.

One instant, I am owning the world, making it my passive backdrop. The next, I am aware of myself in frozen suspension, a tumbling passive weight of body falling helpless and surprised to whatever crunching impact the world has in store.

The self makes no sense without its world. And Metzinger’s focus on phenomenologising the one side of the equation - what is is like to be a mind - leaves out the other of what it is like to be my world.

That is the key to the Umwelt, and a Kantian epistemology in general. Descartes did not get the enactive equation of minds being modelling relations.

The fact is that brains exist to make a discrimination of self from other, self from world. And one is not more fundamental or real than the other. They are together the two complementary halves of the one phenomenological relation.

As relata, both are equally a construction of the modelling. Selves and worlds are to the same degree “illusions” of the mind. And yet also useful illusions as both are involved in organising physical change in the actual physical world.

There is a trail. I am indeed running it. This is possible because I have a fluid and dynamical sense of the fact that relies on a sharp discrimination of what seems self, and what seems other, in any given moment.

Treating consciousness as a screen of neural representation is homuncular. Who is there to witness the display.

An enactive and pragmatic view of consciousness says the “neural screen” is really a filter of self-other discriminations that support a dynamical accomodation of organismic goals to environmental opportunities.

As sensory deprivation experiments reveal, both world and sense of self disintegrate quickly when there is nothing to sustain a process of self-other discrimination. Sensory receptors need physical variation that can start the whole business of “having phenomenology” in terms of being a self in its world - the bit that knows it stands apart from the bit is not a part of.

….Or the tl;dr version. :grin:

Which should one problematised as the essential scientific question?

What kind of thing is this ineffable phenomenal self? Or what is the neurobiology of sensori-motor discrimination?

What counts as evidence is pretty straightforward for the later.

Do rocks make self-other discriminations? Not from the available evidence as rocks on trails don’t actually grab at your skimming feet.

And the fact that these discriminations cash out in terms of voluntary and goal-constrained physical actions makes overt behaviour perfectly good evidence of sentience. We can reliably detect agency in terms of counterfactual self-other discriminations that make a real difference in the real world.

So there is no self, and there is no world. These are modelling constructs. What there is instead is a running habit of discrimination where we are continually dividing our phenomenal existence along those lines. — apokrisis

So the "owner" of the model is constructed by the model's very functioning -- it's not some pre-existing thing that then adds to itself a model by which it distinguishes itself from its environment. The running model is that distinction, and without it -- or at death -- there is no self to "have" such a model.

And we can call this a "holistic" approach to -- I guess "experience" as a big vague catchall? Or maybe just "life"? Something like this goes on anywhere an organism maintains its organization as a going concern, yes? It's just that not all organisms develop the additional capacity to "monitor" (non-homuncularly) this constructed self to some degree.

It all sounds broadly Heideggerian to me. ;-)

it's not some pre-existing thing that then adds to itself a model by which it distinguishes itself from its environment. The running model is that distinction, — Srap Tasmaner

Right. It’s the logic of the dichotomy or symmetry breaking. The self is defined in terms of not being the world, and the world is defined in terms of not being the self.

Rather than having to imagined neurobiology following a complicated computer engineering approach - some kind of homuncular self model being grafted onto some kind of world model - you just need a simple neural learning algorithm.

Every newborn baby is born a blooming, buzzing, confusion of impulses and reflexes. The infant waves clenched fists about without any idea they could be instruments of its will. But a few accidents where hands are open and reflexive closing grabs objects in the world, then further learning leads to the skill of moving them to mouth or throwing them around the cot, and you can say the child knows the hands are a part of a self that is opposed to world.

So no sense of self or knowledge of the world needs to be genetically baked in. A baby’s neurology will self-organise around the central idea that there is the part of the world that is the handled, and the part of its world which is thus the handler.

hese are modelling constructs. What there is instead is a running habit of discrimination where we are continually dividing our phenomenal existence along those lines. At every scale of biological and neurological being, from metabolism, to immunology, to feet acting on ground, we are having to decide what is self, what is other. — apokrisis

I read Metzinger as saying essentially this. Up to and including the self/world distinction as a bodily modelling process with environmental feedbacks.

So no sense of self or knowledge of the world needs to be genetically baked in. A baby’s neurology will self-organise around the central idea that there is the part of the world that is the handled, and the part of its world which is thus the handler. — apokrisis

I don't know what Metzinger says about psychogenesis, though it would surprise me if he believed the self is "genetically baked in" - considering his minimal phenomenal selfhood idea doesn't contain a self as usually construed. And specifically, tonic alertness is construed as an essential component (and precursor of) what we'd normally construe as a self - which is the autonomous cortical feedback of that blooming, buzzing confusion of impulses and reflexes.

the properties of subatomic particles that give rise to flight in birds are present in the subatomic particles that make up rocks
— Patterner

However, such bare reductionism presents no credible account of the higher-level factors that come into play in the organic domain. You could never deduce from the examination of fundamental particles the principles of organic chemistry, let alone evolutionary biology. Furthermore as you're no doubt aware physics itself nowadays seems to implicate the higher-level (and non-reducible) role of the observer. — Wayfarer

I'm not sure what you mean by deduce. If you mean, for example, someone who has never heard of chemistry or organic chemistry, but knows all the rules of physics, would never come up with the idea of organic chemistry, or evolutionary biology, you’re probably right. But that’s because our intellect’s are not up to the task. I am not aware of any events taking place in the realms of organic chemistry or evolutionary biology that are not reducible to fundamental particles.