From: specimenNOSPAM@curioustaxon.omy.net   
      
   On 1/22/26 1:42 PM, MarkE wrote:   
   > On 23/01/2026 5:21 am, Mark Isaak wrote:   
   >> [...]   
   >> You don't seem to grasp that complexity can emerge from the   
   >> environment, if you make the conditions to allow it to. You would, I   
   >> think, describe human language as having high functional complexity.   
   >> Yet all you need to do to go from a language with a finite and small   
   >> number of short declarations to a language which allows an infinite   
   >> number of possible sentences that can express endless ideas is to   
   >> allow recursive grammar. That's one change. Not a trivial one by any   
   >> means, but not a show- stopper either.   
   >>   
   >> Higher intelligence is probably even simpler. All you need is a bigger   
   >> brain (and women's hips to accommodate it). That could happen with a   
   >> tiny change to one regulator gene. And once you have the larger brain,   
   >> that also allows more proficient tool use, which then allows writing,   
   >> which then allows libraries, which then allows civilization.   
   >>   
   >> Do you accept that going from Cro-Magnon to walking on the Moon   
   >> requires no new mutations at all?   
   >>   
   >   
   > In terms of overall mental capability, the chimp to human increase might   
   > be likened to say word processors*, n generations apart (where n > 1).   
   > As a programmer, you know that this requires megabytes of new specific   
   > information. Why do you imagine that mere bits would suffice for the   
   > chimp to human scenario?   
   >   
   > * Acknowledging that computer software and biological systems are   
   > different in many ways, but nonetheless subject to the same constraints   
   > in relation to functional complexity.   
      
   I reject your analogy utterly.  In terms of overall mental ability, the   
   chimp to human increase might better be likened to RAM memory, n   
   generations apart. All that requires is more of the same, plus some   
   engineering advances in miniaturization. That's still a poor analogy,   
   because neurological processes are not as simple as arrays of flippable   
   bits, but the point remains: Nearly all that is required is more of the   
   same neurological processes.   
      
   --   
   Mark Isaak   
   "Wisdom begins when you discover the difference between 'That   
   doesn't make sense' and 'I don't understand.'" - Mary Doria Russell   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)