Brain Expansion (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, April 06, 2020, 13:41 (1481 days ago) @ David Turell

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?

DAVID: 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.

I asked the question because whenever I attack your theory of evolution (but I don’t attack your theory of design), you claim that “the ID folks are with me”. They are not.

I agreed with an article you quoted, and pointed out that it did not in any way contradict my theory.

DAVID: 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.

Of course it doesn’t support my theory – it doesn’t deal with the subject! That’s why I asked you why you’d quoted it!

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.

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

I do. Now please tell me how the above quote invalidates my 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!

DAVID: Of course not. Not allowed.

So according to you, the fact that nobody discusses my theory must mean that my theory is wrong, but the fact that nobody discusses your theory means…what?

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.

DAVID: 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.

You constantly gloss over the general principle: the modern brain does not expand (I would say cannot, for anatomical reasons), but earlier brains could and did. We know that brains change when they are made to perform new tasks. It is therefore not unreasonable to propose that they did the same in earlier times, when there was room for expansion. Nobody knows what caused expansion. But we can extrapolate a general principle from what we know. Your summary of the theory is silly. I have told you over and over again that my theory follows the pattern of the modern brain’s behaviour: it is the EFFORT to implement the concept that causes the change.

Dhw: 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?

DAVID: Simple, I believe in God, based on vast study of the science of evolution and biochemistry.

No facts yet.

DAVID: 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.

“Ignore”? That issue lies at the very core of my theory! In dualist terms the previous, smaller brain was not complex enough to design and make the artefact which – oops, you forgot to mention this - the soul had first conceived and which was based entirely on known information. The dualist’s soul only uses the brain to acquire information and to implement (= design and make) the artefact. The small brain which had the original idea now has to come up with advanced abstract thought for new designs and production, i.e. the brain has to perform new tasks, and so it is the EFFORT to design and make that causes the expansion. You’ve got it, except that you keep forgetting the soul’s original idea which sparks the whole process off.

And you still haven’t produced a single FACT to support your theory.