From: specimenNOSPAM@curioustaxon.omy.net   
      
   On 1/24/26 8:59 PM, MarkE wrote:   
   > 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.   
      
   So convince me. Enumerate, with references, the qualitative differences   
   between human and chimp cognition.  If you can get your list over 500   
   items, I'll concede your point. Myself, I can't get past three, and I'm   
   guessing on two of those. But then, I have not studied chimp cognition   
   in depth.   
      
   --   
   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)