Brain expansion (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, June 27, 2020, 10:30 (1608 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Your theory demands expansion from force of a new concept, as I understand it. Which logically brings up the contradiction, why stasis after forced expansion?

dhw: Because, as you agreed on the other thread, stasis means nobody came up with any new ideas. What does this contradict? Do you think the implementation of a concept through expansion must automatically lead to new concepts? Why? Yet again, it is the dualist’s soul, not the brain that comes up with concepts.

DAVID: But as I view it the brain must be complex enough to allow the new concepts.

Once again you use the word “allow”. If the dualist’s soul does the thinking, you can certainly argue that it can only use the information given to it by the brain, which must also be complex enough to implement it. How on earth does that come to mean that once the brain has expanded, there should be no stasis and the soul should immediately come up with new ideas? There is no contradiction!

DAVID: The extra neuron circuits had clear guidelines for the necessary changes. Guidelines work.

dhw: Your theory has God dabbling more neurons than necessary and then you have the complexification system removing the superfluous ones “on its own”. What a mess! Why can’t you stick to our earlier agreement? In the sapiens brain, complexification took over from expansion and proved so efficient that certain cells were no longer needed.

DAVID: Not a mess. Full capacity for the new uses that would come. The new uses were anticipated. The bold is correct in my view. That doesn't disturb my logic.

The new brain-size would indeed have full capacity for the new uses, because complexification would take over. What do you mean by the new uses were anticipated? God looked into his crystal ball and knew that humans would one day produce Shakespeare and Einstein and rockets to Mars? That still doesn’t solve the mystery of why, according to you, he dabbled the unnecessary degree of expansion and then left it to autonomous complexification to get rid of the unnecessary bits and pieces. THAT is the illogical mess!

dhw: You have forgotten the point, which is the ongoing expansion of an existing organ, the brain – not the formation of new species. […]

DAVID: The change from habilis to erectus is not a new development, and a new species. New sized brain, new skull size, new mother's pelvis and this not species change? You are grasping.

The video does not deal with new sizes of organs but with species that have no apparent antecedents. A bigger sized organ is not a new organ or a new species. It is you who are grasping.

dhw: New thoughts appear using EXISTING brain complexity (the spear example). And what on earth is “the thought quality of brain”? Once and for all: in dualism the soul does the thinking. Yes or no? It uses the brain for information and for implementation as defined above. Yes or no?

DAVID: Yes and no. Please add, in life, the soul must use in its companion brain to create thought, the complexity dependent upon presently existing brain capacity for complex thought.

dhw: I have explained precisely HOW the soul uses the brain. The complexity of thought does not depend on existing brain capacity for THOUGHT. The dualist’s brain does not do the thinking! Stop muddying the waters!

DAVID: I'm not allowed to follow my theory, but only yours counts? The opposite of the bold is exactly my theory and you know it. The soul, in life, must use the existing complex brain neuronal networks to think. More advanced networks, more advanced thought allowed.

You are juggling with words again. Yes, the dualist’s soul uses the information provided by the existing brain in order to do its thinking. But the existing brain does not have a capacity FOR THOUGHT – its functions, as we have agreed over and over again, are to provide information and to implement (defined earlier) the soul’s thoughts. Your addition to this implies that the brain thinks (the brain’s “capacity for complex thought and earlier "the thought quality of brain"). If you believe that the brain thinks, you are a materialist, and you may well be right. So tell us outright: do you believe the soul does the thinking? Or do you believe that the brain also thinks?

DAVID: Does new-sized brain and artifact appear simultaneously? What happened to stasis? That is the gross weakness of your idea.

dhw: Yes, the new-sized brain and the new artefact appear simultaneously, because the artefact can only appear when the brain has finished expanding sufficiently to produce it. What is your problem with stasis? The new-sized brain has implemented the concept. That does not mean that our homo now has to think up lots and lots of new concepts! We have agreed: stasis means “nobody came up with any new ideas”. There is no mystery here. My theory is all the stronger for the fact that you can’t seem to find any other weakness!

DAVID: My explanation of 'stasis' from the other thread applies.

Dealt with on the other thread.

DAVID: Think your theory is strong?

If your only objection is that you believe a new-sized brain ought to come up immediately with lots of new ideas, then yes indeed. Do you really believe that as soon as the brain expanded, mothers should have produced a load of Shakespeares and Einsteins?