Oh, come on! It has nothing to do with materialism but everything with complex systems and what we call "ecosystems" - with the stochastic-within-fundamental-la

Oh, come on! It has nothing to do with materialism but everything with complex systems and what we call "ecosystems" - with the stochastic-within-fundamental-laws nature of what we call universe or reality. Ecosystems could exhibit what appears (to an external [hypothetical] observer) to be a conscious, "intelligent" behavior due to obeying to underlying "forces" or "laws" - physical, environmental (herd behavior, etc.) economical (energy expenditure, diminishing returns), evolutionary (which affects populations). Forest or town formations (which appears to be "optimal", "designed", while they just grew up causally out of individual "processes") are obvious examples. Financial markets could be [falsely] viewed as "intelligent", while it is just a stochastic individual actions and "herd behavior". Ants or bees colony, a big city at night, viewed from an aircraft - they all appear to have consciousness of its own, but no, it is mere an appearance. Nevertheless we cannot assert that these formations are purely chaotic - they are shaped by a chance, but in accordance with the underlying forces and laws which govern (or limit) behavior of individual "agents" within the system. Just like all these atoms - they have their positions due to multiple causes (stochastic processes), but in accordance with fundamental laws of what we call "gravity", "magnetism and electricity", "conservation of energy", etc. There is no "intelligence" or "consciousness" apart from that, or That, as a Hindu would call it.