From: me22over7@gmail.com   
      
   On 25/01/2026 10:00 am, Mark Isaak wrote:   
   > 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.   
   >   
      
   "Utterly"? Like I said, we have very different perspectives of how   
   things are.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)