That they’re not autonomously solving complex tasks is a bit of a straw man though, and with a bit of creativity we can easily imagine them being combined with models and modalities that do provide executive function and autonomy.
Do you think that Markov chains can reason and plan? Dijkstra’s algorithm? Curious where you draw the line
Our brains however are highly modular (a “committee of idiots”) so who’s to say a portion, and even a significant one, doesn’t operate on similar principles?
These are ballpark counts of cells in crow’s brain, a human’s brain, and a human body. The question is, is it the cells themselves doing the reasoning and planning, or are they just the machinery this disembodied process happens to be running on? I’d argue intelligence is a distributed phenomenon that our DNA is as much a party to as our brains.
Certainly the question of whether humans use DNA to reproduce or DNA uses humans is a matter of perspective.