June 27, 2012
June 19, 2012
The human brain
How often do we hear that humans only use 10% of their brain? "Imagine what humans would do if they used a greater part of their minds!"
Yet there has been a species with a larger brain than the human one, Homo neanderthalensis.
The final answer is very simple: the humans don't use the totality of their brain because they don't need to; the human brain is larger due to its ontogeny.
It is well known that humans do not use but approximately 10% of their brains and often one asks himself what would happen if a bigger part of the brain were used. But is this something that is possible? Sure, it could happen but it would be due to some physiological dysfunction (or some other similar phenomenon) and it wouldn't mean that it is the way it should normally function.
The case of the human brain is a nice example for the principle of exaptation. During the evolution of the humanoids, Homo neanderthalensis was the one species that had a larger brain than the one of Homo sapiens (humans). The reason is very simple: the brain was larger because it could. Human brains are quite big as well, for the embryological reason that it was able to grow more. This means that we do not actually need more than the 3/4 of our brain, we just have it because during the early ontogenesis, the nervous tissue of the region of the head gets larger than the one of other animals. It is a passive process that does not consist of a specific adaptation or a need. Indeed, it is quite useless to have such a large brain since humans -and much more neanderthals- do not even use half of it. But the organism is not able to find a way to use it from a physiological and histological point of view.
The large brain that we are so proud of is therefore something that we olny have a partial use for, and from the moment that we know that, the myth that we could be much smarter if we could use more than 10% of this organ seems irrelevant.
Yet there has been a species with a larger brain than the human one, Homo neanderthalensis.
The final answer is very simple: the humans don't use the totality of their brain because they don't need to; the human brain is larger due to its ontogeny.
It is well known that humans do not use but approximately 10% of their brains and often one asks himself what would happen if a bigger part of the brain were used. But is this something that is possible? Sure, it could happen but it would be due to some physiological dysfunction (or some other similar phenomenon) and it wouldn't mean that it is the way it should normally function.
The case of the human brain is a nice example for the principle of exaptation. During the evolution of the humanoids, Homo neanderthalensis was the one species that had a larger brain than the one of Homo sapiens (humans). The reason is very simple: the brain was larger because it could. Human brains are quite big as well, for the embryological reason that it was able to grow more. This means that we do not actually need more than the 3/4 of our brain, we just have it because during the early ontogenesis, the nervous tissue of the region of the head gets larger than the one of other animals. It is a passive process that does not consist of a specific adaptation or a need. Indeed, it is quite useless to have such a large brain since humans -and much more neanderthals- do not even use half of it. But the organism is not able to find a way to use it from a physiological and histological point of view.
The large brain that we are so proud of is therefore something that we olny have a partial use for, and from the moment that we know that, the myth that we could be much smarter if we could use more than 10% of this organ seems irrelevant.
February 13, 2012
The use of logics in science
The goal of scientists is to retrieve data and emit hypotheses on a question they ask themselves. They seek the truth about something using logics to guide them through their work. Taking into consideration the facts, the data, they try to treat it correctly, in an objective manner, and have results that reflect the real phenomenon. But how well does this work? There are some examples that reflect this idea, I'm going to talk about the one that I know best, having encountered it during my studies.
There is this known controversy of mathematicians and physicists against evolutionary biologists and palaeontologists: the first two fail to understand how it is possible for organisms with survival rates close to zero to actually survive. Following the laws of probabilities it is indeed impossible for living beings (such as the horse or even humans to take as some popular examples) to survive in the struggle for life. Yet they still exist and others, with better mathematical survival-probabilities, disappear very rapidly. Should these scientists think a bit outside the box, would they understand how evolution works; it is not about what we should find, nature -and life- does not always work that way.
But this is only an example of how scientific logic works. How can we be sure that we are open-minded or that we even can be right in the treatment of data?
In the book of Stephen Jay Gould "Time's arrow, time's cycle", the author refers to F. Engels saying how it is impossible to think out of the trends and the ideas of our times. This is just another point to the fact that scientists do not know everything, as much as they'd like to think they do (I admit that I should include myself in this category...).
So can scientists be certain to explore a problem from every possible aspect?
There is this known controversy of mathematicians and physicists against evolutionary biologists and palaeontologists: the first two fail to understand how it is possible for organisms with survival rates close to zero to actually survive. Following the laws of probabilities it is indeed impossible for living beings (such as the horse or even humans to take as some popular examples) to survive in the struggle for life. Yet they still exist and others, with better mathematical survival-probabilities, disappear very rapidly. Should these scientists think a bit outside the box, would they understand how evolution works; it is not about what we should find, nature -and life- does not always work that way.
But this is only an example of how scientific logic works. How can we be sure that we are open-minded or that we even can be right in the treatment of data?
In the book of Stephen Jay Gould "Time's arrow, time's cycle", the author refers to F. Engels saying how it is impossible to think out of the trends and the ideas of our times. This is just another point to the fact that scientists do not know everything, as much as they'd like to think they do (I admit that I should include myself in this category...).
So can scientists be certain to explore a problem from every possible aspect?
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