Of course it can, but as far as we are concerned it is irrelevant.
I think it is relevant in approaching the subject of truth. Is truth reducible to biochemical reactions?
Is the paramecium any less true than I?
That wasn't where I was heading. What is truth for a paramecium? Is truth for you reducible, in principle, to the same thing as a paramecium? Stimulus/response? If not, what's the difference?
That's part of what taste is, isn't it? Is that not true? Truth can't be just what we experience. Otherwise we are creating the world in our image. Most religions have done just that.
What is truth for a paramecium? Is truth for you reducible, in principle, to the same thing as a paramecium? Stimulus/response? If not, what's the difference?
What is truth to you or to me? Not only do we not know what the truth is for Paramecium, but we don't have a clue what is truth to the person sitting next to you.
Paramecium is part of the truth—a reminder that the word is nor just for us, about us or from us. Just as we don't see or hear the entire electromagnetic spectrum, we don't know everything, and therefore can not know what truth is.
What is the purpose or reason the universe exists? The sulfur volcanoes on Io, or planets orbiting stars too distant for us to reach (the closest star is 4 light years away)? It takes light on average 1.3 seconds to reach the Moon. The light from our Sun takes eight minutes to reach us, and 100,000 years to cross our galaxy; 2 million years to reach Andromeda galaxy, our closest galactic neighbor.
There are more stars in the visible universe than there are grains of sand on all of earth's beaches...and you talk to me about truth. Who are we kidding? We can't handle the truth.