More "miscellany" (General)

by David Turell @, Tuesday, November 16, 2021, 15:27 (864 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: It is therefore absurd to claim that designing a species-changing organ which is required for survival means that survival plays no role in driving evolution to the next stage. What is evolution if it is not changes in body forms which lead to speciation?


DAVID: Word play. Survival does not drive evolution is my point. Yours is an attempt for pure Darwinism.

dhw: The word play is yours. If a new body form is designed to aid survival, it makes no sense to say that the design was not driven by the need or desire to aid survival.

Off my point, survival does not act as a driving force for evolution


Magic embryology
dhw: I am trying to get you to distinguish between established patterns that work automatically and the solving of new problems together with the origin of the established patterns, which is when autonomous intelligence comes into play.
dhw: For some reason, you digressed from this important distinction, and returned to the 50/50 game.

DAVID: The reason is I think all cell decisions are automatic. No autonomous intelligence.

dhw: You always illustrate your belief in automaticity by referring to established systems. It is the solving of new problems and the ORIGIN of established systems that demonstrate intelligence. I will continue to point this out whenever you try to oppose the theory with your automatic examples.

Yes, God's intelligence at work.


Predicting perception
QUOTE: "Consequently, many neuroscientists are pivoting to a view of the brain as a “prediction machine.” Through predictive processing, the brain uses its prior knowledge of the world to make inferences or generate hypotheses about the causes of incoming sensory information. Those hypotheses — and not the sensory inputs themselves — give rise to perceptions in our mind’s eye. The more ambiguous the input, the greater the reliance on prior knowledge.

DAVID: all along in the past I have predicted the brain is built to help us perceive. It makes perfect sense to view it that way.

dhw: I’m sure we would all agree that the brain helps us to perceive. The above quote simply relates to the fact that our perceptions create “Gestalten” [patterns], and of course these are based on experience, which never ends. This is not “prediction” unless the subject of the perception requires looking into the future, so I don’t understand why the authors have decided to focus solely on this one term. If I see thunderclouds and the air is still and stifling, and I have lived through a thousand thunderstorms, I may predict that there is going to be a thunderstorm. But if I see and hear little Johnnie crying and clutching his bleeding leg, I will assume that he has hurt his leg and is in pain and needs treatment. There is no prediction involved. Yes, our perceptions and inferences and hypotheses will depend on prior knowledge, but prediction is simply one of the brain’s activities. Deduction is another.

Agreed.


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