Thread

Two parallel neural ectoderm progenitors contribute to the developing brain

137 points · 80 comments · Jimmc414

carefree-bob · 1789760305 · focus · HN ↗
There was a book in the 1970s called "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" by Julian Jaynes, where he argued that ancient civilizations -- and he used examples from Homer -- lacked the current modern sense of self-consciousness. If you look at their behavior, they interact with some external divine voice that drives their actions, whereas if you read modern literature you see people being driven by an inner voice which they associate with themselves.
This shift from the "bicameral mentality" of the external voice to the modern mentality of the inner voice was hypothesized by Jaynes to be rooted in some biological changes in the brain. At the time there was split brain research that showed these two parts of the brain function independently almost as two different minds in the same skull. See this 2007 survey: <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6323702_The_bicameral_mind30_years_on_A_critical_reappraisal_of_Julian_Jaynes'_hypothesis" rel="nofollow">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6323702_The_bicamer...
1. dinobones · 1789763579 · focus · HN ↗
  Not relevant to the article.
  Also, that study is extremely dubious/barring on fan-fiction.
  Homer (if he was even a person) recited oral epic poetry (that we've lost most of) and we've written down an extremely lossy version of it.
  Why should we take any of the mythical character's interactions with mythical gods as any insight for the brains of real humans???
  It'd be like year 4000 historians citing World of Warcraft claiming the Lich King is a very obvious example that humans lack an internal monologue because he was not able to distinguish his own motives/actions between Ner'zhul/Arthas (both spiritual entities inhabiting the "Lich King" body).
  1. glenstein · 1789767170 · focus · HN ↗
    I mean I definitely disagree with the book's argument, and you're right that it's making a different argument than the article, but I think straight up declaring it irrelevant is coming in way too hot. It's also an argument for a merging of separate mental structures that's sourcing the change in an event from recent natural history.
    Again, I don't agree with the book's argument, but declaring an argument proposing a similar convergence on the basis of entirely different reasons to be not even mentionable in response to the article is just getting way too overzealous with comment section policing.
    hn_throwaway_99 · 1789768634 · focus · HN ↗
    Uh, no.
    The premise (and this is how the GP comment put it) was that humans around Homer's time had fundamentally different brain structures, and that differences in poetry and thinking processes could be explained by looking at how brains changed over the last few thousand years.
    That's not "overzealous comment section policing". It's rejecting a premise that is completely infeasible with everything we know about human evolution (or relative lack thereof) during that timespan.
    glenstein · 1789769219 · focus · HN ↗
    Uh, yes. It's overzealous because personally disagreeing with something doesn't mean that it's outside the scope of the subject matter that the article is speaking to. If anything, you're reaffirming the commonalities between the theory and what's proposed in the article because what they have in common is a proposed difference in brain structures followed by a convergence.
    The fact that you disagree with the truth of the theory has literally nothing to do with whether it's on point in response to an article that's about the same subject matter. I would have hoped that me saying multiple times that I disagreed with it would have made clear already that there's more going on here than just a matter of whether you do or don't disagree with it. Declaring that it's "not overzealous" mirrors my language back at me but without attaching an actual argument to it.
    graemep · 1789838509 · focus · HN ↗
    What could plausibly cause that change in just a few thousand years?
    I cannot see how this could be true without it following that not everyone will have this change as it is far too recent to have spread to everyone every where. Where are these people who lack it?
    glenstein · 1789843990 · focus · HN ↗
    My read was that they were also disagreeing with it (and I personally disagree with it too for exactly the reasons you mention).
    But the problem in this case isn't just that it's right or wrong, it's that it at least belongs to a related family of arguments that are fair game to explore in response to the article. Some of the best conversations take the form of knowing something is wrong but powering through the struggle of putting the why into words, and all the associated conversational branching that can happen along the way.
    jibal · 1789801794 · focus · HN ↗
    "too hot" and "way too overzealous" is ad hominem, and talking about comment section policing is remarkably hypocritical -- you're actually telling someone not to make certain sorts of comments, which pointing out that something is not relevant to the article doesn't do. Your "not even mentionable" is a complete fabrication -- the comment from dinobones said nothing of the sort. Your whole shtick about "getting way too overzealous with comment section policing" is a complete fabrication -- a projection of what you are doing onto a simple factual statement. And your "Uh, yes" comment below is more obnoxious trolling and attacking strawmen.
    My immediate reaction to the comment about Jaynes's book and the split brain was that it's not relevant to the article, and it conflates three very different things. The comment omits the crucial fact that the split brain research was on people whose corpus collosum had been cut -- no surprise that "these two parts of the brain function independently" since they were no longer attached to each other (which is the complete opposite of what TFA is about). Jaynes's hypothesis was not related in any way to that research, and neither are related in any way to TFA. As someone else noted: "Okay but this article is about evolution hundreds of millions of years ago." -- the clear implication being that Jaynes and split brains aren't relevant. But if anyone actually dares say so, here comes the too hot overzealous comment section policeman to project his own attributes onto them.
    And this is completely aside from whether Jaynes's argument is valid ... you saying multiple times that you disagree with it is also utterly irrelevant and reflects one of several fundamental errors in logic in your comments. But criticisms of your comments is not "comment section policing" -- how absurd ... and dinobones didn't even do that in simply saying that a comment wasn't relevant to the article ... only in your head was "and therefore you are not allowed to post it here". Presumably the comment was made in good faith. I can even grant the same about yours, with a bit of straining and extraordinary charity.
    I won't respond further.

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