Big brain evolution: changes in sapiens skull shape (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, February 03, 2018, 11:26 (2236 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw:.... The only evidence we have “at hand” is the ever-changing bush of life, which includes humans, and as above you still haven’t explained why this does not suggest that your God’s purpose was to produce an ever-changing bush of life, including humans.
DAVID: As I noted in the other (autonomy) thread, God did produce an ever changing bush of life to supply energy to allow His evolutionary process to produce the final step, the human brain.

Answered on the autonomy thread. You are simply repeating your belief, but you still haven’t explained why the ever-changing bush of life, which includes humans, could not denote that your God’s purpose was to produce an ever-changing bush of life that includes humans.

DAVID: The s/s/c uses the cortex to think. The s/s/c (software) both develops concepts and implementation by using the brain (computer). As you sit at your computer and create a play, you come up with the concept for a play and then you create the dialogue (implement) all using your s/s/c. How can you separate concept and implementation as you attempted above.

dhw: Separating concept and implementation is the whole essence of dualism! You keep agreeing that the s/s/c does the thinking and the brain does the implementing, and you separate the two processes with your analogy of software (soul) and computer (brain). As for your attempt at a new analogy, the dialogue and stage directions ARE the concept of the play, conceived and developed entirely by my s/s/c. The computer (brain) does not contribute a single thought, and I do not “use it” or even need it to think! I use it to implement my thoughts by giving them the material form of material letters, and I use the printer to put the material letters on material paper.

DAVID: It seems to me you have described a brainless process of producing a written play. Aren't you thinking in that thing that occupies your skull in the brain pan.

Yet again, do you or do you not believe that the soul does the thinking and the brain does the implementing? You've said umpteen times that you do, and yet still you insist that you can't THINK without your brain/computer. Of course the brain is inside the head, and you the dualist will have to tell me where you think the soul is located. See below for the absurd extension of your argument.

dhw: As above: the software (s/s/c) does the thinking, and so it makes absolutely no sense to say that the computer (brain) had to expand before the software (s/s/c) could think of its new ideas.

DAVID: Makes perfect sense to me as I sit at my computer, coming up with answers to your statements (concepts) and typing responses (implementation).

dhw: According to your hypothesis, you have to have a computer (enlarged brain) BEFORE you can think up your answers! (And I must have a computer before I think up my play.) Are you really telling me you can’t think of your answers without the computer? Of course you aren’t. The very idea is absurd.

DAVID: I can write a play entirely by hand, but my s/s/c still had to use my brain to have the thoughtds to create it. Why are you are inferring I see my brain as separte from my body, when all I am pointing out is my brain is, in a sense, my onboard computer.

You are the dualist, but even a dualist does not infer that his brain is separate from his body! Yes, your brain is the onboard computer, and according to you, your soul provides the ideas which the computer implements by giving them material form. If you now think the soul is incapable of thinking without the brain and you are incapable of working out your answers without your computer, then renounce your dualism, and we can tackle the issue of brain enlargement from a materialist standpoint.


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