Brain Expansion (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, April 27, 2020, 13:34 (1460 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Now please tell me what reasoning is “generally accepted” and which part of it I have contorted.

DAVID: You have contorted the underlying conclusion of all the Archaeological reports with your strained theory.

Please tell me what underlying conclusions the reports offer to explain why and how brains expanded.

DAVID: […] I start recognized need (not a hard part) and then with design as you do. I would remind you design implies visualizing a possible product solution. That is the hard part.

dhw: No disagreement here. [...] how does this prove that the earlier brain had to change BEFORE it even knew there was a hard part to tackle?!

DAVID: Because all the new artifacts are timed as appearing with the newly sized-brains, nothing more.

And my proposal is that the first of these artefacts cannot appear until the brain has finished expanding. So of course they appear with the newly sized brains!

DAVID: How does an earlier brain know of future artifacts? It has to be able to visualize it beforehand to start a design process which is immaterial thought.

It doesn’t know of future artefacts! “Me want kill from distance” starts the process of working out HOW he can kill from distance. That is the design process which induces the “hard thinking”. Theory: if the modern brain changes as a result of “hard thinking”, it is possible that the ancient brain did the same. After all, the modern brain evolved from the ancient brain, didn’t it?

DAVID: tell me about your experiences in conceptualizing a new productive p, and how difficult is any of it?

dhw: I am not a designer. […]

DAVID: Thank you for this honest answer. You've now admitted you are not a designer, and so are theorizing about it. I've answered your question over and over with you never noting any recognition of my points. In my view, you have design and production all confusedly backward.

What is backward? I have agreed with you that design is the hard part! That is the hard thinking that changes modern brains. But I have also pointed out that production and design are interwoven because the process of material production may well lead to changes in abstract design (the brain then provides new information during its function of implementation). But firstly, our discussion is not about the difference between design and production. My point is that it is the "hard thinking" that causes the smaller brain to expand as it seeks to make the original concept into something real. And secondly, how does your experience of design even begin to support your claim that the ancient brain changed BEFORE it even knew there was a hard part to tackle?

dhw: […] We "sat around" for thousands of years till whatever caused the leap forward. So what point are you trying to prove?

DAVID: My view is God created each expansion of thought-capable frontal and prefrontal neuron-rich brain, until it reached a critical mass and could reach new levels of conceptualizing, which is required for new design levels.

So what is your point about our brain sitting around for thousands of years before the leap forward? All expansions coincided with new levels of conceptualizing. What do you mean by a “critical mass”? It couldn’t expand any more? That was my point, which you poo-poohed. And you’ve forgotten again that you are a dualist. It’s supposed to be the soul that does the conceptualizing, and the brain informs and implements. If our homo had a soul, he did not need additional information to form his original concept. New information would only have been acquired in the course of the implementation(= design and production).

DAVID: It is obvious our advanced brain is totally different from the early ones, like Lucy's and following.

Not “totally”. You’ve just told us on the other thread: ”God speciates either by modification of the previous, as in hominin brain growth, or […]”.

DAVID: Our brain shrunk 150 cc in the past 35,000 years, because it had a major complexification process not requiring all the prior giant brain mass it was give, all taken from the frontal pre-frontal neuron networks. How does that factor into your thinking? Just ignore the difference is what you are doing.
And
DAVID: Your so-called natural theory is pure unsupported conjecture based on one fact about our very special final brain that really shrinks with increased hard use. Expand one fact and ignore the other. How illogical wishful thinking! Can you find any support elsewhere?

So your God apparently gave us a bigger brain than we needed. What does that prove? Hard use has not shrunk the brain! If it did, we’d have no brain left by now! As you keep agreeing and then forgetting, hard use results in complexification, which is so efficient that it has made certain parts of the brain redundant. Can you find any support for your theory of a divine 3.8 billion-year-old programme of brain expansions culminating in one that was 150 cc bigger than necessary and therefore shrank, and that responded to new demands whereas earlier brains expanded before the new demands even existed?