Brain Expansion (Evolution)

by David Turell , Sunday, April 05, 2020, 22:05 (1481 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: but the ID folks are with me.

dhw: You say they don’t even mention God, so...

DAVID: God is always implied when they discuss design in evolution.

dhw: do they insist that their implied God specially designed 3.X billion years’ worth of non-humans to eat one another until he could design us, and God expanded brains before souls/brains could come up with new ideas?

They do not discuss my theories. They concentrate totally on the need for design, designer. Why did you ask the question when you should know the answer from my previous discussions

QUOTE: "However, plant food in general yields considerably less energy and nutritive value than meat. Therefore, being able to hunt for large animals, which was only possible by using tools such as spears, made it possible for humans to sustain larger and more complex brains, which in turn allowed them to develop yet more intelligent and efficient tools." (David’s bold)

dhw: Yes, the larger brain would have required more feeding. Yes, once the brain had expanded, it would have been able to design and develop more intelligent and efficient tools. How does this invalidate the proposal that each expansion was triggered by a new concept from the smaller brain? How does it prove that developing and making the FIRST artefacts could not have been the cause of the expansion?

DAVID: Total distortion of the meaning of their comment. No one in what I read makes that theoretical jump. They think that evolution caused the enlargement and bigger better brains make bigger better artifacts. We never see a discussion of your lonely theory.

dhw: What distortion? I agree with the quote! But it does not in any way contradict my theory, so why did you quote it?

That it doesn't disagree means it doesn't support either. Have you every found any third party support? Answer, no. because it is not discussed by anyone except dhw.

QUOTE: "Until about 50,000–40,000 years ago the use of stone tools seems to have progressed stepwise: each phase (habilis, ergaster, neanderthal) started at a higher level than the previous one, but once that phase had started further development was slow.” (dhw’s bold)

dhw: Fits in perfectly with my proposal that the trigger for the expansion was a “higher level” of tool which the smaller brain could not design and make. “Further development was slow” is what I referred to as periods of stasis.

dhw: No comment from you!

You know I totally disagree with your unsupported pipe dream of a theory.

DAVID: God expanded. But at the natural level I see no one discuss your weird idea., and I've looked.

dhw: Because they don’t deal with the question of what caused expansion! I don’t suppose any of them say “God caused expansion” either!

Of course not. Not allowed.

DAVID: The enlargements are small and involve primarily memory activity, not new abstract concepts, although you have sneaked design in your list of activities, and our only known example is Einstein, with a one centimeter enlarged area, and we cannot know if he was born with it or developed the tiny area from thinking.

dhw: If Einstein was born with it, we need to discuss the materialist interpretation of thought. If he developed it, you cannot escape the conclusion that thought can expand the materials of the brain, so the theory can’t be a non-starter, as you claim below.

Contra to your imagined giant early expansions, Einstein's area was one centimeter. His soul could use it. I do not understand how knowing some current info and realizing attack at a distance is good, but not knowing how to do it, grows a brain 200 cc.

DAVID: The quotes observe bigger brain and bigger, better artifacts, nothing more, but the implication is obvious. […] My position is God expanded the brains and your natural theory is a non-starter.

dhw: I know your position. If “each phase started at a higher level than the previous one”, and if the modern brain changes as a result of new activities, the obvious implication of the two facts combined is that the new phase started at a higher level because new activities had made it change – in this case, expand. Nobody knows what causes expansion, so I don’t know why you think these two facts can’t be used as a possible explanation. Now please tell us what facts you have to support the theory that your God expanded the brain before it could have an idea based on existing information?

Simple, I believe in God, based on vast study of the science of evolution and biochemistry. He creates the better brain to allow the soul to abstractly design the new artifact. The issue you totally ignore is the required ability to do advanced abstract thought for new designs. The previous brain cortex was not complex enough to do the job for the soul.