Tag: mind

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The mind as an evolutionary innovation was made possible by a functional change of the brain,

Puno, Peru
Puno, Peru


which acquired the ability to communicate within a network, and by a functional change of this network, which facilitated the motivation of the individuals involved and the control of their instincts.

The motivational impulses in the network, which bestow vital energy and without which individuals and social groups are not viable, have been identified as the nucleus of the human mind. The development up to the beginnings of the mind also takes place within the framework of Darwin’s theory of evolution. However, in the end, there is a new stage of existence.

The intellectually gifted human being has emergent characteristics for whose description, beyond biological theory, a separate set of rules is required.

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VI.     Summary

Hypothesis 22

The evolution of brain and mind

Rail journey to Lake Titicaca, Peru
Rail journey to Lake Titicaca, Peru


The task at hand was to present the evolution of the mind in accordance with Darwin’s theory of evolution.

Previous attempts at solutions based on the co-evolution of brain and mind have been rejected because the mind assumes the brain has already been completed developed (both factually and temporally). In addition, the emergent qualities of the human mind still cannot play a role on the biological level of brain development.

The proposed solution is based on a succession of the evolution of brain and mind. The development of the brain with the stages of prenatal growth, postnatal growth, and the networked brain can be plausibly explained based on the Darwinian theory of evolution without using the influence of mental or cultural factors as a justification.

The influence of the mind would then be an additional and not necessarily an explanatory cause to be rejected according to the principle of Ockham’s razor.

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Hypothesis 21

Outlook

Rail journey to Machu Picchu, Peru
Rail journey to Machu Picchu, Peru


After the beginnings of the human mind, the development of human culture begins. However, this is no longer our topic.

How the human mind develops, what laws it follows, and what dependence there is on the biological nature of human beings – these are exciting philosophical questions that cannot be discussed here.

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The new level of existence of the spiritual requires a different set of rules,

Schoolchildren, Cusco, Peru
Schoolchildren, Cusco, Peru


one which is developed by the humanities and social sciences. The appropriateness of this must be continually re-examined in detail.

(The distinction between levels of existence and the phenomenon of emergence are dealt with in philosophical literature in the context of the theory of strata or stratification theory, of which Nicolai Hartmann is the best-known recent exponent, cf. N. Hartmann, Der Aufbau der realen Welt. Grundriß der allgemeinen Kategorien­lehre, Berlin 1940, 3rd edition 1964.)

In the 3rd hypothesis, I rejected the concept of co-evolution of culture and brain. There is another reason for this rejection: Culture as an emergent characteristic belongs to the level of existence of the spiritual. That is why it could not even be present when the brain, which belongs to the biological stage of existence, developed.

Here I have shown where the boundary between the spheres of the biological and the spiritual runs.