New Miscellany2: intelligence, savannah, Cambrian, origins (General)

by dhw, Friday, March 28, 2025, 12:54 (7 days ago) @ David Turell

More about cellular intelligence

DAVID: Cells are built to have an enormous degree of automatic adaptability to changing circumstances.

dhw: You seem to think that by inserting the word “automatic” you have proved that Shapiro is wrong. […]

DAVID: I remind you, Shapiro's theory is an extrapolation from what free-living bacteria can do.

Please stop pretending that Shapiro knows nothing about other life forms, and that you have greater knowledge of cell behaviour than Shapiro, Margulis, McClintock, Albrecht-Buehler and all the other scientists you have quoted on this website as believers in cellular intelligence.

The savannah theory

dhw: You claim that the new findings “dilute” the savannah theory. I say the new findings are irrelevant to that unknown first cause. You agree. So in what way do the new findings support your theory that your God operated on a group or groups of tree-dwellers [...]?

DAVID: All we can know is they did descend. Why is unknown but I think God did it.

So why do the new findings “dilute” the savannah theory but don’t “dilute” yours?

The Cambrian

QUOTE: "Now, picture early animals trying to survive in such an extreme environment. This was the reality for early animal life in oceans and seas about half a billion years ago. This was also the time when animal diversity boomed, in what is known as the "Cambrian explosion".

DAVID: for once, a logical set of reasons for developing early life forms. Today's extremophiles show how they modify to handle stressful environments.

DAVID: (referring to the authors) I never agreed with them!!!

dhw: “For once, a logical set of reasons for developing early life forms” sounds like agreement to me. But that was before I pointed out to you that they were talking about the Cambrian.

And you even mentioned extremophiles as another example of the same process.

DAVID: It is always my point God designed the animals to handle the new conditions.

Your opinions vary day by day. You regarded this article as providing a logical explanation for the Cambrian.

Theoretical origin of life: soda lakes

QUOTE: "The origin of life could therefore be closely linked to the special environment of large soda lakes, which, due to their geological setting and phosphorus balance, provided ideal conditions for prebiotic chemistry. This new theory helps to solve another piece of the puzzle of the origin of life on Earth," says Walton.

dhw: “The origin of life could be closely linked….” would only help to solve the mystery if it WAS closely linked. Every week we read about sensational new discoveries that will somehow solve various mysteries but somehow don’t actually do so. (See all the articles about the origin of sapiens which actually tell us nothing about the origin of sapiens.)

DAVID: a new and interesting approach. Land-based fossils do not support the idea. I still favor deep sea vents.

dhw: I thought it was generally agreed that life began in the water. In that case, how would land-based fossils support either theory?

DAVID: It can't.

Just clarifying. Thank you.

The brain’s cleaning fluid

DAVID: the brain floats in a liquid which is a very good way to protect it from blows to the skull. The CSF must pick up waste and remove it. We still don't know how. Such a intricate system must be designed.

dhw: It’s worth remembering that these experiments are carried out on mice, offering yet more proof that the human brain has evolved from earlier brains, as opposed to “de novo” creation.

DAVID: Wow! evolution is progressive process, but God can design jumps for that process.

Are you saying that the human brain did not evolve from earlier mammalian brains?

The human brain

QUOTES: Our brain is wired up to be social.

"These findings challenge the idea of a single evolutionary event driving the
emergence of human intelligence. Instead, our study suggests brain evolution happened in steps. Our findings suggest changes in frontal cortex organisation occurred in apes, followed by changes in temporal cortex in the lineage leading to humans.”

I’m amazed that anyone should think human intelligence and/or the brain did anything but evolve in steps! And I would suggest that our brain was not wired up to be social, but being social was a crucial driving force in the wiring of the brain.

QUOTE: "Richard Owen was right about one thing. Our brains are different from those of other species – to an extent. We have a primate brain, but it's wired up to make us even more social than other primates, allowing us to communicate through spoken language."

And language is also the product of our sociability, as an enhanced means of communication would have enhanced our ability to survive and to improve the conditions under which we survived. In brief, new wiring does not precede development but takes place in response to new conditions and ideas.

DAVID: finding this difference is not surprising. Connectivity is one form of complexification, another is an increased number of interconnected neurons. The human brain has more of both.

A neat summing up of the history of the human brain’s evolution: past brains complexified and expanded when they needed more capacity for complexification.