Brain complexity: learning new tasks (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, December 29, 2017, 09:07 (2522 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: There is no evidence the brain rewires in anticipation of new concepts or implementations.
dhw: Thank you for this important concession.
DAVID: Not a concession. Fact.

The concession is that your own hypothesis of brain changes preceding conceptualization has no basis in fact, unlike the hypothesis that conceptualization CAUSES changes to the brain.

dhw: I’ve explained before why I don’t like your computer analogy, so let’s stick to the brain and the s/s/c. Here is a clear statement of your beliefs as I understand them: the s/s/c uses the brain as a source of information and as a tool to implement its concepts, but it does not use the cortex to do its thinking because it is the s/s/c that does the thinking. Correct or not?
DAVID: No, the s/s/c uses the brain/cortex to think. Brain and s/s/c work seamlessly.

They can hardly be “seamless” if, as you believe, the s/s/c can live on separately from the brain/cortex (as in NDEs). They are interdependent, but – if dualists are correct – there has to be a distinction between mental and physical functions. And so if the s/s/c does not use the brain to gather information and to implement its concepts, what DOES it “use” the brain for?

dhw: That does not mean the pre-frontal cortex is the SOURCE of concepts. To use your messy computer analogy, that is like saying the computer is the source of the ideas put into it by the software. That is why I have asked for clarity above. If the s/s/c does the thinking, it is the source of concepts.
DAVID: I sit at the computer keyboard and operate its software as I wish to produce results. Seamlessly. I am in control of my consciousness, which developed as a blank slate from birth.

You have agreed that you ARE your soul/self/consciousness (s/s/c), so your utterly confusing computer analogy (which equated software with soul and computer with brain) now has your soul operating your soul. And all this confusion is meant simply to squirm out of the obvious fact that if your dualistic mind and body are separate entities (though working interdependently), it is the mind/soul/self/consciousness and not the material brain that is the SOURCE of concepts.

DAVID: Size is not the real issue...
dhw: So please stop harping on about the fact that modern usage did not come about until after the final enlargement.
DAVID: …It is initial complexity. The original sapiens brain had an enlarged highly complex frontal and prefrontal cortex with many more neurons and axon branched connections before it was used for modern concepts.
dhw: Of course there was initial complexity, and I suspect that in the last 10,000 years that complexity has increased. Both enlargement and increasing complexity depend on plasticity, not the other way round (see below).
DAVID: 200cc of new cortex is not cased by plasticity. that occurs after the jump in size and complexity.

The “case” could not have contained the extra 200cc if it had not been plastic enough to expand. (See below)

DAVID: God gave us free will to use the gift of the complex brain as we wished. Our concepts, not His.
dhw: [..] you challenged me to tell you which specific concept forced the final enlargement, and so I have challenged you to tell me which specific concepts followed on from your God’s supposed enlargement of the pre-sapiens brain and the final one of the sapiens brain. Or do you think each successive divine enlargement was for no particular purpose at all?
DAVID: Each God-given enlargement allowed a more improved lifestyle, moving from survival living to current civilization.

No specific concept, then, but I’ll settle for this, except that in my hypothesis it is the quest for a more improved lifestyle, moving from survival living to current civilization, that has CAUSED each enlargement and, after pre-sapiens, each complexification. The history of the brain follows the same pattern as the rest of evolution: a process motivated by survival and/or improvement.

DAVID: The complexity of our brain allows for the degree of plasticity we have. Previous brains had lesser levels of complexity and plasticity.
dhw: I suggest that it is the brain’s plasticity that has allowed for both enlargement and complexity.These NEEDED plasticity in order to occur.
DAVID: Plasticity has been shown to shrink the brain through complexification.

True. However, it is not enlargement/complexity/shrinkage that “allows for the degree of plasticity”, but the degree of plasticity that allows for enlargement/complexity/shrinkage.