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A Brain with “Multiple Demand” Is What Drives Human Reasoning, Scientists Say

21 points by rustoo 5y ago

cestith 5y ago
The article starts with asserting multiple times that reasoning is a uniquely human trait, yet offers no evidence at the point of that claim. While on the surface we might like to take that at face value, we really shouldn't. The same thing was said about language until it was proven otherwise. Tool use, too, was proven not to be so unique to us, and later tool construction. Forward planning was thought uniquely human, but tool construction implies otherwise (as does my dog going to grab his favorite toy on the way to go outside and leaving it just inside the door for when he comes back in the house). Emotions other than fear were said to be unique to us, then we saw compassion within and across species. It's been shown that dogs and their people produce the same oxytocin response when looking one another in the eye. We've taught animals mazes, food choices, which lever is a reward vs a punishment, to sniff out truffles/drugs/explosives/cancer and communicate to us that they've found them. Dog can alert us to seizures, low blood sugar events, traffic, and the mood & possible intent of other humans. What of these can be done without some level of reasoning about the world? To dismiss everything every species of animal does as instinct and elevate ourselves and superior and special in every way is hubris. Are we better at language, reasoning, creating tools, and such than other species? Sure. Does that mean we can say any of those things are distinctly and uniquely human without dismissing evidence about several other species? No, I don't think we can.
- Comevius 5y ago
  Especially weird because this multiple-demand pattern of brain activity that plays a central part in fluid intelligence is commonly found in primate brains. https://www.jneurosci.org/content/36/33/8574 https://www.jneurosci.org/content/36/33/8574
- willcipriano 5y ago
  I am fairly certain this crow[0] is reasoning about water displacement. [0] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZerUbHmuY04 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZerUbHmuY04
- fuzzfactor 5y ago
  >The article starts with asserting multiple times that reasoning is a uniquely human trait, yet offers no evidence at the point of that claim. Especialy when lack of reasoning is far too common and has never been completely overcome. Which extreme of behavior might ultimately guide the future of humanity itself, or be responsible for the state of affairs so far? Or which might be a foundation for building a society to begin with, and the other for tearing down? That could be like people saying it's human nature when something barbaric (re)occurs. When it's actually vestigial inhuman nature rearing it's ugly head, because when you think in terms of understood humanity, that's not it.
dmux 5y ago
I don't follow this subject matter too closely, but I have read Marvin Minksy's "Society of Mind." Doesn't this "multiple demand" concept mirror what Minksy described back in the late 1980's as conflict and compromise between individual "agents"?
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csense 5y ago
How meaningful is location for brain analysis? You can reliably predict which physical DRAM cells are used to store your lives in the original Super Mario Bros on NES hardware (and you can manipulate that value if you have a Game Genie). But you'll have a rather difficult time doing the same for your health level in Minecraft on a Windows PC. Is the brain more like an NES, where the software generally uses the same place for the same thing? Or is the brain more like a modern PC, where the physical location of any value is pseudo-randomly set by complex interactions of different subsystems -- paging, processes, OS and programming language allocators, garbage collection, etc., and will change from machine to machine, or even run to run on the same machine?

21 points by rustoo 5y ago

The article starts with asserting multiple times that reasoning is a uniquely human trait, yet offers no evidence at the point of that claim. While on the surface we might like to take that at face value, we really shouldn't. The same thing was said about language until it was proven otherwise. Tool use, too, was proven not to be so unique to us, and later tool construction. Forward planning was thought uniquely human, but tool construction implies otherwise (as does my dog going to grab his favorite toy on the way to go outside and leaving it just inside the door for when he comes back in the house). Emotions other than fear were said to be unique to us, then we saw compassion within and across species. It's been shown that dogs and their people produce the same oxytocin response when looking one another in the eye. We've taught animals mazes, food choices, which lever is a reward vs a punishment, to sniff out truffles/drugs/explosives/cancer and communicate to us that they've found them. Dog can alert us to seizures, low blood sugar events, traffic, and the mood & possible intent of other humans. What of these can be done without some level of reasoning about the world? To dismiss everything every species of animal does as instinct and elevate ourselves and superior and special in every way is hubris. Are we better at language, reasoning, creating tools, and such than other species? Sure. Does that mean we can say any of those things are distinctly and uniquely human without dismissing evidence about several other species? No, I don't think we can.

Comevius 5y ago
Especially weird because this multiple-demand pattern of brain activity that plays a central part in fluid intelligence is commonly found in primate brains. https://www.jneurosci.org/content/36/33/8574 https://www.jneurosci.org/content/36/33/8574
willcipriano 5y ago
I am fairly certain this crow[0] is reasoning about water displacement. [0] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZerUbHmuY04 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZerUbHmuY04
fuzzfactor 5y ago
>The article starts with asserting multiple times that reasoning is a uniquely human trait, yet offers no evidence at the point of that claim. Especialy when lack of reasoning is far too common and has never been completely overcome. Which extreme of behavior might ultimately guide the future of humanity itself, or be responsible for the state of affairs so far? Or which might be a foundation for building a society to begin with, and the other for tearing down? That could be like people saying it's human nature when something barbaric (re)occurs. When it's actually vestigial inhuman nature rearing it's ugly head, because when you think in terms of understood humanity, that's not it.

dmux 5y ago

I don't follow this subject matter too closely, but I have read Marvin Minksy's "Society of Mind." Doesn't this "multiple demand" concept mirror what Minksy described back in the late 1980's as conflict and compromise between individual "agents"?

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csense 5y ago

How meaningful is location for brain analysis? You can reliably predict which physical DRAM cells are used to store your lives in the original Super Mario Bros on NES hardware (and you can manipulate that value if you have a Game Genie). But you'll have a rather difficult time doing the same for your health level in Minecraft on a Windows PC. Is the brain more like an NES, where the software generally uses the same place for the same thing? Or is the brain more like a modern PC, where the physical location of any value is pseudo-randomly set by complex interactions of different subsystems -- paging, processes, OS and programming language allocators, garbage collection, etc., and will change from machine to machine, or even run to run on the same machine?