I agree, brain wiring is not completely determined and yet it is determined to
some extent. In other words, the wiring follows a general principle that
rules this type of things. As I made clear before, I don't think our genes
have the exact 3D information of every cell in our bodies, but it does have
the machinery to knit us together fearfully. I hope you are not confusing me
with someone else.
Now you are going again off the path as I see it. I have repeat ably said
that I don't see the connection between the wiring of the brain and darwinism
or its derivatives. Once again you seem to go on some different route. In
this message you ended up talking about free will, but we have not been
talking about free will. In the previous message you ended up talking about
the old-earth-flood, but we were not talking about that either. We were
talking about the wiring of the brain and I asked, what does that have to do
with macro-evolution? As I remember it has to do with the fact that some
people (IDers?) claim that all the information for the wiring have to be in
the genes in a supradeterministic way. I said I don't agree, and added that,
nevertheless, the "necessary" (but not sufficient) information has to be in
the genes. No genes, no brain. Finally I said that the general wiring
pattern is somehow determined by a natural principle (Bejan's Principle or
some other like it). So the "necessary" info that so beautifully take
advantage of Bejan's Principle (as our inner ears take advantage of gravity
for balance) to wire the brain must have been in the genes. As someone else
said, the machinery necessary to do the Job was coded. I think this is a good
summary of what I have shared with you on this topic; unfortunately my
question remains unanswered - what does brain wiring have to do with macro-evolution?
Salu2
Eduardo
Glenn Morton wrote:
>
> Hi Eduardo,
>
> At 07:11 PM 11/4/97 -0600, Eduardo G. Moros wrote:
> >Hi Glenn,
> >
> >First of all, let's try to narrow the topic lest we get all entangled-up and
> >people start thinking I'm discussing old-earth geology with you. On the
> >matter in question, I thought we were talking on the wiring of the brain. On
> >this subject you may be interested in the recent articles by Bejan. He says
> >that the "tree" networks in nature are fully "deterministic" in nature. I'll
> >give you some links below. I'm not 100% sure Bejan's discovery applies in
> >this case but I think it does.
>
> Here is why I don't think that it applies. One can clone a tree, and the
> branching patterns is not identical in the two offspring. Thus while the
> tree shape is universal, the exact position and length of each branch is NOT
> determined by Bejan's type of dynamics. The brains wiring is not entirely
> determined either.
>
> Now before we continue this exchange have in
> >mind that I have not read the book you read and that I have not read "all" the
> >posting on the ASA reflector on this subject. I usually concentrate in a
> >single point and I am usually brief because time is a prime commodity these
> >days in my career. Now, I am more than willing to carry on a discussion on a
> >given point. I have said a couple of times the last two days that I see no
> >connection between your (or Deacon's) argument and darwinian derivatives.
>
> I would suggest that you take a look at the article. To determine the exact
> branching pattern requires numbers, lots of numbers. You have to have an
> number representing the x location, the y location and the Z location for
> each of the 10 billion neurons. You then have to specify the number of
> dentrites off of each cell (another 10 billion numbers) and you then have to
> have 3 numbers to specify the length and direction of each dendrite. Only
> with all these numbers is the brain truely determined. If you don't have
> that many numbers then you have an underdetermined system--a system that has
> freedom to do what it wants. It is also a system in which no one can say,
> "My genes made me do it." because there is not enough storage space in the
> dna to contain that many numbers. Thus no one can say they are a murderer
> because of their genetic make up; no one can say they are gay because of
> their makeup. WE have freedom to do what we decide.
>
> glenn
>
> Foundation, Fall and Flood
> http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm