Brain expansion: different theories about rapid expansion (Evolution)

by David Turell , Monday, September 21, 2020, 15:13 (1522 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: The issue is that you have a fixed notion of God’s role, and I offer an alternative. If God exists, then you propose direct design and I propose self-help mechanisms which he designed. There is no “masquerade”. Meanwhile, once more: you have agreed that the modern brain complexifies and also adds cells without any intervention by God. So why is not feasible that the same process applied to earlier brains?

Again a twist to the facts. Our brain started out extra large and shrunk during complexification. In that process highly used areas enlarged a little. Perhaps that is what happened in earlier brains.

DAVID: your thought avoids all the discussion of the issue of stasis after enlargements.

dhw: We have dealt with stasis over and over again. It is not an issue. In my theory, after new requirements had necessitated the initial expansion, there was a period when there were no more new requirements. This occurred after every expansion and it took sapiens approx. 280,000 years (short compared to some other hominids and homos) before new requirements caused further brain changes. The only oddity lies in your own theory: why did God expand the brain 280,000 years before it needed to be expanded? We’ve been over all this, and again you are avoiding the question of why the modern process which is independent of your God’s involvement might not also have been at work in earlier brains.

We only have fossil history to analyze, and stasis is an issue based on our species. It is clear enlargement always led to advances and I assume stasis at each stage of human evolution, by a process I call learning to use it .

dhw: […] since the history of the brain is that of an organ whose cell communities complexified and expanded to their present state of complexification and minor expansion, which you agree functions without your God’s intervention, I see no reason to assume that earlier cell communities did not do the same. And yes again, their intelligence may well have come from your God.

DAVID: Once again we disagree about the qualities of God's personality. God will not do it through the agency of cells own actions.

How do you know?

DAVID: You have forgotten the error discussion.

dhw: I wish I could.

Sorry you don't like the obvious issues

DAVID: God cannot allow cell advances on their own when errors do occur. That is why in the past I mentioned slight variations from His evolutionary plans (mild errors) could possibly slip through, on his allowance of it. I think not, but it is a question to be raised and addressed.

dhw: According to your initial theory, the evolutionary cell advances WERE the errors. Remember? They changed the course of evolution. He couldn’t prevent them, but he allowed them to go through if he liked them, and you were all in favour of chance until it was pointed out that this made you a Darwinian. Then the “errors” became slight variations, and now you’re not even sure that even these occurred. I don’t know why you’ve bothered to raise the subject since now there is nothing of importance to be addressed, and it does not even begin to answer the bolded question in my first entry above, and repeated throughout my post.

The problem for me is simple. Cells make molecular errors. Therefore God has to have hands-on control of each step in evolution. Do your intelligent cells know when they made an error? Is it your cells that set up editing systems to correct themselves? Before or after they realized errors could happen?