Brain complexity: baby brains under study (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, February 07, 2018, 13:52 (2481 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: New born babies have very incomplete fiber pathways and only a small number of neurons as compared to adults. As a result they show no emotional reactions other than crying. This essay looks at it for answers:
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/why-dont-babies-smile-from-birth/?utm...

DAVID’s comment: the point of this essay is that there is very little going on in the infant's brain at birth, but it does develop rather quickly. Another aspect of the infant starting as a blank slate.

There is no blank slate if, according to you, 40% of the personality is contained in the genes. Even crying proves there is no blank slate. On 29 January, as below, we reached agreement on this, so please don’t start all over again.

DAVID: My view: We can end this discussion on this point: a person expresses his personality from a zero developmental point at birth. There is a background of source material that is preprogrammed, that with nurture, and experience in living shapes the final personality structure that carries him through life. That structure can be modified by onesself (rare) or by counselling (more common).

dhw: Very happy with most of this. The blank slate personality has finally disappeared (“background of source material that is preprogrammed”), I would leave out “final” (if a structure can be modified, it is not final), and I would add that the structure can be modified by accident, disease and experience (especially traumatic). Pax?

DAVID: From my experience, the final structure generally can only have very small modifications. Pax.