Evolution: more genomic evidence of pre-planning (Evolution)

by dhw, Tuesday, April 06, 2021, 12:46 (1109 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: ALL brain expansions (including sapiens) came about because of an immediate requirement, after which the WHOLE brain was used until its capacity for complexification was exhausted, and (with the exception of sapiens) more cells were needed in response to new requirements.

DAVID: This is the natural, no God argument. It does not answer why the enlargement had to include a huge expansion of 200 cc in the mostly unused prefrontal and frontal conceptual areas.

It is an argument that allows for God as the designer of an autonomous mechanism for complexification (you agree) and expansion (you disagree). How huge is “huge”? All earlier expansions were around 200cc.

dhw: I keep reminding you that even early sapiens did not change his lifestyle, because lifestyle until modern sapiens consisted mainly of improving methods of survival. Example repeated ad nauseam: the hunter with a new spear remained a hunter.

DAVID: Of course this advance in a mechanical hunting tool required conceptualization in the frontal lobe. My thought is not that not many additional neurons were needed for that advance compared to current use for advancements.

How do you know the number of neurons needed hundreds of thousands of years ago to meet the requirements of new ideas, tools, clothes, conditions, use of fire etc.? There is no point in comparing earlier advances (revolutionary in their day!) to ours, which in any case are implemented by complexification, not expansion.

dhw: Your objections to this proposal have been 1) that the sapiens addition was too huge (it was the same as all the other expansions).

DAVID: Volume use, yes, but specified areas of frontal lobe enlargement totally ignored.

I have just pointed out to you that erectus’s frontal and temporal lobes expanded, and you agree that new tools required front lobe conceptualization, so earlier lobes would also have been expanded in order to implement new concepts.
You have left out 2) – no change in lifestyle.

3) dhw: it was the frontal and temporal lobes that expanded (nothing unique in that). What is your next objection?

DAVID: Mainly frontal expansion, and the main point of my argument is the ability to conceptualize new concepts there, with help from temporal area with language development putting ideas into words starting roughly 70,000 years ago, 250,000 years after the initial enlargement. Stasis! Temporal lobe has sensory, visual, auditory and some memory coordination uses, not conceptual thought origination! Why do you persist in ignoring specificity of area enlargements?

You have just agreed that “advance in a mechanical hunting tool required conceptualization in the frontal lobe”. Therefore the frontal lobe would also have expanded! You’ve switched your period of stasis from 300,000 years to 250,000 years, but it doesn’t make the slightest difference. Humans build on the advances made by their predecessors, and I am proposing that ALL their successive brains expanded, as concepts became more and more complex. The sapiens expansion of the frontal and temporal lobes would initially have been the response to some new concept, and then, according to you, there were no more major new concepts (hence stasis) till language came along 250,000 years later, which would have resulted in the complexification of the frontal and temporal lobes, as these could not expand any more without causing anatomical problems. What is your objection?

DAVID: If you believed in God as the designer it would make perfect sense.

dhw: Thank you for at last agreeing that expansion in response (as opposed to anticipation) makes perfect sense.

DAVID: What are you smoking to confuse my answer that way?

It was your answer to my comment: “…it makes more sense for brains to expand by implementing new ideas than by anticipating them – as proven by the way in which the modern brain RESPONDS to new challenges and does not change in anticipation of them.” What does your answer mean, if not that you only need to believe that God designed the mechanism for my statement to make perfect sense? I have never discounted God as the designer.

Survival
dhw: […] This discussion began with your usual attempt to denigrate Darwin. In the context of his theory that meeting the need to survive is the purpose of evolutionary change, there is no conflict between his theory and yours.

DAVID: Without survival, life disappears. It must happen to continue evolution. I'll repeat again: the conflict is in the purpose of 'survival'. It doesn't drive evolution by adaptation, but by God designing new species.

By survival you therefore mean that as long as there is one living organism, there is life on Earth. Nothing to do with evolution. Of course you can’t have evolution without living organisms, and survival - which means not dying - doesn’t drive evolution! You are messing about with words. What drives evolution is adaptations and innovations whose purpose is to enable organisms to survive, albeit only temporarily. Whether your God designs all the adaptations and innovations makes no difference. If he designs them, it is in order for the organisms to go on living. There is no conflict between the two theories: in both, the purpose of the adaptations and innovations that lead to evolution is to improve chances of survival, as proposed by Darwin.