Dear Gregg, Brent, Aeon and List, if I could just jump in here, much of what is being said by all needs IMHO to be reconsidered in light of the difference between descriptive and mechanistic Biology/Physiology. So for example, semiotics is a description of what I have been referring to with respect to the centrality of cell-cell communication in embryologic development and homeostasis superimposed on phylogeny as the way to understand the process of evolution. That's very different from Darwinian evolution based on a reproductive strategy for more offspring, which is a materialistic viewpoint. In terms of Brent's quest for answering the 'Hard Question' of Qualia, I think the answer lies in the way I have recalibrated Pleiotropy, the capacity of biology to recombine/repermute the same gene for multiple purposes over the course of evolution. Up until now that phenomenon has remained a fascinoma, but seen in the context of evolution, it is explained by the pre-adaptational strategy of reutilizing genes under duress as the most economical way of solving existential problems evolutionarily. In the context of Qualia, perhaps we see 'red' when we are writhing in pain because it references bleeding as a process related to pain, the two processes being linked through common cellular-molecular signaling mechanisms. As for Aeon, I fully ascribe to the idea that we need to address how to re-synthesize philosophy and empiricism if I am correct in thinking that we've gotten evolution 'backwards' and that the unicellular state is the primary level of selection based on the emerging knowledge of epigenetic inheritance. With the Best of Intentions. John