"...ability, intention and the source of thought are possibly of a different order "

the crucial word there being "possibly"....it remains to be seen if we can postulate such a 'different order' with no other basis than not liking its opposite....*smile*.

There is, of course, the theory that a series of bio-chemical switches of enough complexity DO comprise all there is of human behavior. I do not 'like' that idea any more than you do, and I MUST act as though I have 'free will' or 'spirit'...(or whatever)...but IF there is something acting independantly of complex brain function, we don't know what that might be yet. (My 1/3 finished Masters thesis was supposed to be on the possibility of resolving this dilema thru something like A.N. Whitehead's metaphysics.) It may be just that 'spirit' is too loaded a word to use comfortably, and that we are debating will-o-the-wisps of language....it has happened before.