The brain—brainier than believed before
by Carl Wieland
Image stock.xchng
Published: 31 March 2009(GMT+10)
Evolutionists like to argue against creation on the basis of less-than-optimal
(or sloppy, or flawed) design in nature. But optimal or supra-optimal
design, is an argument that is perhaps not used as often as it could be
against evolution. Natural selection acting on random change would not be expected
to produce perfection, let alone result in over-design.
We have frequently shown that the claim of ‘bad design’ is really not
a scientific argument at all, but rather a theological one.1
This is because it is making claims about what a creator supposedly would or would
not do. Since there are no design constraints on an omnipotent creator,2 the argument is inherently flawed.
However, this does not apply when the argument is reversed. Optimal design can be
legitimately employed as a scientific argument against evolution. The neoDarwinian
explanation, as its chief defenders often point out, is not capable of foresight
or anticipation. Evolution does not plan for the best possible end result, only
‘whatever works at the time’ to get more genes into the next generation.
This is why, they say, it results in what they interpret as a ‘jury-rigged’
design (‘jerry-built’ in some cultures).3
When a design in nature can only be described as perfection, even over-design, it
is not something one would expect in a naturalistic, neoDarwinist world.
In arguing as will follow, we can overlook, for the sake of discussion, the other
problems and flaws with the neoDarwinian mechanism (NDM).4 We will focus on the fact that the NDM is only concerned
with survival value (or better put, differential reproductive value, of which physical
survival of the organism is only one part5).
So when a design in nature can only be described as perfection, even over-design,
it is not something one would expect in a naturalistic, neoDarwinist world. In short,
the chances of it being produced by chance are vanishingly small.
One well-known example concerns people who become blind. They are able to develop
new neural pathways that give them amazing auditory and tactile capacities to partially
compensate for their loss. Interestingly, when Braille is used, the visual areas
of the brain are active. Similarly, deaf people actually process sign language with
the same areas of the brain that hearing people use to process spoken language.
This is known as cortical plasticity.6
But why should such mechanisms be there, if evolution is true? The NDM has no compassion,
nor is it concerned with helping the individual. A person disabled in such a way
would be rapidly eliminated, were it not for caring families and friends. But the
NDM is stretched beyond credulity in attempting to explain such marvels. This is
so even when one considers group or ‘kin’ selection possibilities. The
group as a whole does not need such a ‘backup capacity’ to survive,
even to thrive.
Image Wikipedia
PET scan Image of the human brain showing energy consumption
Another example of over-design (i.e. way more than what is needed for survival of
the individual or group) concerns the amazing capacities of the brain in rare individuals,
far in excess of what most of us experience. This usually concerns functions such as
memory, or calculation. It can also be evident in people who are otherwise regarded
as mentally handicapped—so-called ‘idiot savants’, as depicted
in the film Rain Man. Some people exist on this planet who can instantly
recall all the details of what they were doing and what was happening on the news,
etc. for any date you care to mention—even telling you at once what day of
the week that was.
Even if an amazing brain capacity only appears once in a billion individuals, it
shows that the information for it was at some point coded into the human genome.
Why should natural selection have achieved such stunning heights, when the rest
of us clearly demonstrate that it is totally unnecessary for survival?
The latest example of optimal design to come to light—the one that inspired
this article—also concerns the human brain. It has long been thought that
the brain is not a particularly good decision maker. Research in the late 1970s,
that was to earn a Nobel prize in 2002, suggested that ‘humans rarely make
rational decisions’. Ever since, this has been ‘conventional wisdom’
in the field of brain function.7
No doubt, many of us can relate to this on looking back over our lives; the Fall
has had its effects. Evolutionists were likely comfortable in the thought that this
was to be expected. After all, blind selection for survival value is not likely
to put together an optimal decision-making machine. It’s hard enough to imagine
the brain’s enormous processing power8
evolving by naturalistic means, but at least they could be comforted by the prizewinning
research mentioned above that the brain is far from perfect where it counts.
When one looks at the decisions made by the unconscious brain, we generally make
the ‘best decisions possible’.
All of that has now been thrown back into the arena by the research of Alex Pouget,
of the University of Rochester. Pouget, who is associate professor of brain and
cognitive sciences, says that the earlier work referred to conscious decision
making. Whereas, he says, most of our decisions are done unconsciously—for
example, deciding to steer around an object in the road. And when one looks at the
decisions made by the unconscious brain, we generally make the ‘best decisions
possible’.
This capacity for optimized decision-making was determined as the result of rigorous
research using patterns of dots moving on a computer, and also observing the activity
of individual neurons (nerve cells) during the decision-making.
Of course, if the brain is routinely capable of such optimal decision-making, then
it follows that in regard to this function at least, it displays optimal design.
Evolutionary faith is hard to shake once established, but once one’s ‘eyes
are open’ as they say, this is one more addition to the weight of evidence
that makes it much easier to believe that ‘in the beginning, God created’.
Optimally. And that even though we now see the effects of the Fall in a groaning,
suffering, creation, it will be restored to full optimality in all respects, in
that coming New Heavens and New Earth (Revelation 21:1).
Related articles
Further reading
Related resources
References
- See the articles under
What about allegations of badly designed features? Return to
text.
- It is sometimes said that an omnipotent God has no restraints,
but this is not strictly true. God is not free to act contrary to His own character
as He has revealed that to us, e.g. God cannot bear false witness. Also, God cannot
act in logically self-contradictory ways, e.g. create a rock that is too heavy for
Him to lift, or create a married bachelor. For more information, see
If God can do anything, then can He make a being more powerful than Himself? What
does God’s omnipotence really mean? Return to text.
- The favourite example is the eye, but for refutations, see
<creation.com/retina> and <creation.com/fiberoptic>.
Return to text.
- The chief problem being that neither natural selection or
mutation can generate the required novelties, in an informational sense (specified
complexity). See <creation.com/muddy> and <creation.com/beetle>.
Return to text.
- A given gene has a better chance of getting into the next
generation and hence being propagated beyond that again if it helps an individual
organism to survive long enough to reproduce. But this is not the only way. It would
be enough if, for example, it helped in reproduction and/or fecundity itself in
some way. Return to text.
- See also
Brain rewires itself in deaf, blind people-U.S. study, 30 November 1998, and
this
commentary by deaf-blind student in cognitive science, Krista Caudill. Return to text.
- ‘Our unconscious brain makes the best decisions possible’,
physorg.com, in medicine & health/research, 24 December 2008.
Return to text.
- This is not meant to suggest that brain function is really
analogous to digital computing. Professionals in the field will hopefully excuse
it as a convenient shorthand. Return to text.
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