Where does intelligence come from?

[Will]

I tend to define intelligence as the core ability or potential to think and reason. Intelligence for me doesn't involve knowledge or wisdom; I think of it as the raw brain power that you have. So what troubles me at times is why we (humans) are able to think the way we do, reason the way we do, and express our thoughts in such a way that we are able to communicate with one another. Furthermore, where does all this creativity come from!?

 

I know I'm young so there is so much I haven't figured out (and won't figure out). But where do you think intelligence comes from? And doesn't it feel odd that of all the life on this planet, our intelligence is so much greater than other thinking creatures? I don't intend to sound arrogant, because I love animals and I think that they are extremely intuitive and smart, but is it purely luck and coincedence or do you think their is some greater meaning to our intellect?

[Queso]

it didn't necessarily come from anything. the way i understand it is, over time our minds, as well as our bodies, evolved into what we are now. history only goes back a few thousand years because this is still relatively new to us, compared to everything else. i really can't say much because well, i really don't know much. but whatever is to come in this thread, just keep in mind that we really aren't that significant. that's the key to acceptance. or is it? or are there many keys? ah who knows, maybe that was a stupid metaphor. if there are many keys, understanding our insignificance would definitaly be one of the bigger ones.

[Will]

I understand what you're saying orbsycli and I agree that our history isn't significant, but it just seems all too conveinent that we've evolved the way we have over all this time. I mean think about how we think and think about how our body's work and everything.. I don't mean to go on a tangent, so let's focus on intelligence. Think about how our minds work. For us to have evolved to this point just seems so conveinent, and I suppose because our individual lives are so short we can never see evolution to any great extent. But I'm curious to hear what other people think.

[Queso]

not our history, us..ourselves, the human race! (echo on race)

i'll leave my contribution to this thread at that.

[Will]

yeah... i know what you meant. i'm saying that the history of our race has been short. we've only existed for so long and we've only documented so much of our race's history (we obviously couldn't take note of history before us)

 

but what i'm saying is i find it so conveinent that we are the way we are. it just seems like there was some greater purpose sometimes.. and i'm not religious at all, but i just find that all of this.. our ability to think, reason, create.. it's wild.

[IDMclean]

You mean our ability to mentally evolve? That is what has brought us to this point is the fact that we can rapidly adapt to an enviroment due to our ability to mirror that which we see. To comprehend, remember, analyze, and extrapolate. Take something and strech it out to so much more.

 

We evolved as we have, as I understand it, because we have a structure that has evolved in our brain and a small number of other creatures which allows us to "mirror" things we see. We're furless because of this ability.

 

Fur attracts bugs, paracites, and molds. When it's cold we just put on some fur rather than grow it ourselves. A mechinizism that would take millions of years to evolve we create in a matter of a few generations. Humans are no more intelligent than anyother creature there is. Just that we have things that give us advantage over other creatures...

 

I hope this is just me ranting I have a hard time telling some times. Anyway I hope that helps.

[Will]

I disagree with you that we are no more intelligent than other animals. Even within humans there are varying levels of intelligence, however comparing ourselves to other animals you can see that we do possess intellectual superiority to most of them. I don't know many animals that construct city's and do so with purpose in mind.

 

There are plenty of creatures that create homes and find their niches in them, but do you find animals that write poetry, question the heavens, construct and navigate aircrafts through the air?

 

My question is where does this intelligence come from. How is it that our brains evolved the way they did? Why are we able to even have this discussion right now? Other animals couldn't, but for some reason we've been gifted with the ability to think the way we do, and my question is why do you think we can?

 

Is it simply the evolution of our race? Were there gods that created us this way? As I said before, I'm looking for arguments involving philosophy or science.

[alexander]

I don't know many animals that construct city's and do so with purpose in mind.

well aside from arguing that humans are a part of animal kingdom, ants and termites do, and their cities are bigger than ours were until the 20th century, and are still bigger than smaller cities of today, proportionaly to the ant size ofbourse. Purpose? house the colony and protect their eggs(embrios, whatever) and qween...

How is it that our brains evolved the way they did

i think that that can get as phylosophical as how did the universe first come into being. In short i think that due to the bending of the rules of the universe at one point in time a mind started thinking differently due to a mutation, and this mind was able to better survive than the other beings, because species used tools to help themselves out, then about a hundred some odd thousand of years later, bam, we can thing, theorise, test, experiment, do consider things that are less intelligent, less intelligent, and so forth...

Actually i dont think that umans as we are now is the first race of intelligent beings on this planet, I've been fascinated with the possibility of atlantis...

[Biochemist]

My question is where does this intelligence come from. How is it that our brains evolved the way they did?

There are fundamentally two schools of thought:

 

1) We evolved by virtue of random events. First, life was created as a product of random events. Subsequent random events yielded even more complex life. In this model, intelligence is a random event. To be consistent, you also need to assume that morality is non-existent, and that free will/choice is impossible. We just have a perception of morality and free will to improve our chances at survival.

 

2) The other model is that we were created by a Creator that imbued us with certain characteristics, one of which was intelligence. Typically this school also believes that the Creator established some boundaries for morality as well.

[TeleMad]

There are fundamentally two schools of thought:

 

1) We evolved by virtue of random events. ... Subsequent random events yielded even more complex life.

 

No, no, and no. Evolution is not just a series of random events, even though Creationists almost always misrepresent it as such. Evolution also includes NATURAL SELECTION, which is not random.

 

Biochemist: 2) The other model is that we were created by a Creator that imbued us with certain characteristics, one of which was intelligence. Typically this school also believes that the Creator established some boundaries for morality as well.

 

Yeah, God showed us that it is moral and righteous to kill someone's children, at least if doing so tests to see if the parent truly loves us. That's what God allowed Satan to do to Job to test Job's love for Him.

[Will]

Now this is the kind of thoughtful discussion I enjoy ;)

 

I just wanted to clarify though for those who misunderstood me, I am not trying to be arrogant in saying that we are intellectually superior, it is just how I feel. I feel strongly connected to every living thing on this planet and so the fact that I can reason better than an ant doesn't mean that I feel superior to that ant. (I feel superior to the ant for other reasons.. but I don't wanna get into that)

 

I admire the ant colonies and from what I understand those ant civilizations are very complex and all the ants serve a purpose. It's considerably more efficient than our democratic societies, but at the same time it's so regimented. What I think seperates us from the ants and all other creatures though is our ability to understand things or at least think we understand things...

 

Now obviously other animals and insects understand things too. I have three dogs, so I watch them very carefully and I see that they watch things and regardless of what anyone will tell you, dogs have complicated minds like ours. They may not think in sentences like we do, but we have the advantage of language.

 

Anyway, I'm jumping all over the place, but I really like what I'm reading here. I feel like if we were all put here by God or whatever the greater powers might be, it makes sense. It's the simplest explanation afterall. Think of it.. God created us. Done. That's it. And if that's true, it's still beautiful.. But I prefer the idea that animals have changed overtime.. adapted to their environments.. evolved.. survived. It opens doors to so many further questions, which will never be answered or that I see not rational explanation for. Although I imagine there are plenty of theorists who could change my mind.

[Biochemist]

Evolution also includes NATURAL SELECTION, which is not random.

Do explain how natural selection is not random. If it is directed, please identify what or whom was supplying the direction.

[Biochemist]

I am not trying to be arrogant in saying that we are intellectually superior, it is just how I feel.

I didn't take it as such. It struck me as a sincere question.

I feel like if we were all put here by God or whatever the greater powers might be, it makes sense. It's the simplest explanation afterall. Think of it.. God created us. Done.

There is some simple elegance to it, but simplicity is not always a close approximation to the truth. Lots of natural phenomenon are counteruntuitive.

 

To me, most of quantum mechanicsis seems counterintuitive.

 

Some three-space shapes (when assessed with standard calculus techniques) have finite volume and infinite surface area. That means you could fill them with paint and not cover the inside surface. That seems counterintuitive.

 

Then again, if the natural world is counterintuitive at times, perhaps God ought to be as well.

[TeleMad]

TeleMad: Evolution also includes NATURAL SELECTION, which is not random.

 

Biochemist: Do explain how natural selection is not random.

 

It's kind of in the name ... SELECTION.

 

Biochemist: If it is directed, please identify what or whom was supplying the direction.

 

It's kind of in the name ... NATURE.

[TeleMad]

If you follow this discussion (which I posted in reply to someone else here at Hypography) you should be able to see that natural selection is not random as well as how nature what does the selecting.

 

TeleMad: Mutations that would disrupt a structure occur much more frequently than mutations that would improve a structure. But if the disruptive change occurs in some structure that needs to continue to function for the organism to be fit, then those changes will be eliminated. If the structure is not needed for fitness, then there is no functional constraint and the mutation is not selected against.

 

We can see this in eyes. Eyes are very important to both prey and predators: if you have defective eyes, you die, either because you can't escape with the rest of your group, or because you can't catch things to eat. So eyes are under functional constraint: deleterious mutations to eyes are eliminated by natural selection. (At the same time, neutral mutations can accumulate and natural selection will also tend to preserve any advantageous mutations that happen to arise)

 

But what about organisms that once needed their eyes but have moved to a new habitat where they don't? For example, some cave-dwelling fish still have very partial eyes form, even though the eyes can't form images, nor can they detect light (there is no light in the caves). These fish used to have eyes, which is plain to see, but because the functional constraint on eyes for these fish was removed when they permanently moved into lightless conditions within caves, mutations that were disruptive to eyes were able to accumulate: natural selection did not eliminate those mutations, unlike it would have if the fish remained in their original habitat. Over a relatively short period of time, the fish lost their eyes.

 

The point is that we can see that natural selection does in fact continually work to eliminate disruptive mutations if the structure is under functional constraint. If it didn't, all animals would be blind like the cave-dwelling fish.

[Biochemist]

If you follow this discussion (which I posted in reply to someone else here at Hypography) you should be able to see that natural selection is not random as well as how nature what does the selecting.

The fact that the intrinsic complexity of higher animals steers them toward survivable features is obligatorily a development of earlier random events or design. Either you believe we are chemical bags of solution, behaving in accordance with the laws of chemical reactions (and alway have, since the promordial soup) or you believe that the end solution was designed. You can't argue against randomness and against design. You rule out all possibilities.

[TeleMad]

Biochemist: You can't argue against randomness and against design. You rule out all possibilities.

 

Are you SURE you're not a Creationist? They often times setup false dichotomies, like you just did, especially when it comes to Creation vs. Evolution.