@aperez241

Thanks for this two links! I think we can find more exemple of observed speciation for species with faster/shorter cycles of reproduction.

The first light sensor had to be linked to the rudiments of the communication system somehow. We can see that bacteria or algae can swim towards or away from light, without having a brain. The whole system evolved together. We can see nowadays anmals like some larva that have very simple, two-cells light sensory organs directly connected to the nerve fibers that manage muscle movement.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081119140705.htm

The nervous system evolved to coordinate the cell functions in an animal and as it became more complex took more functions.

I decided that I'll continually add novel examples to this thread, as opposed to creating new ones.

Saliency refers to the way in which visual objects pop out and grab our attention, such as red apple on a white desk. Attention itself can be viewed from many different angles, as either a spotlight or a zoom lens, as either a feature that enhances information or a bottleneck that constricts information. The bottleneck approach is the most reasonable in evolutionary terms. Information takes up storage space and energy, and attention provides a way to focus on what is important by reducing the resolution of everything else.

When it comes to the relationship between saliency and attention, there appears to be a winner-take-all rule in place (Koch & Ullman, 1985). The most salient location wins, and attracts all of the attention. However, its clear that in a winner-take-all situation, there is another computational issue: how do you prevent the organism from getting stuck attending to the most salient object (Itti & Koch, 2001)? The answer appears to be inhibition of return, which supresses the neurons attending to the most salient object, causing vision to not only cascade down to the next most salient object, but prevents it from returning to its previous location. Experiments shows a slowing down in reaction time, when participants are asked to attend to a previous location as opposed to a new one, once attention has moved past to the next most salient object (Klein, 2000).

So, again, here we have two independent features of a subsystem than need to co-evolve. It doesn't make much sense for the mechanisms driving inhibition of return to evolve before those of saliency-driven attention; it puts the cart before the horse. Likewise, to have saliency-driven attention before inhibition of return, produces organism that become unable to attend to other things in their visual field once they are locked into an object. The best solution is one in which both emerged simultaneously.

References:

Koch, C. & Ullman, S. (1985). Shifts in selective visual attention: towards the underlying neural circuitry. Hum. Neurobiol. 4, 219–227.

Itti, L., & Koch, C. (2001). Computational modeling of visual attention. Nature, 2, 194-203.

Klein, R. M. (2000) Inhibition of return. Trends Cogn. Sci. 4, 138–147

The conflict between science and religion may have its origins in the structure of our brains, researchers at Case Western Reserve University and Babson College have found.

"Clashes between the use of faith vs. scientific evidence to explain the world around us dates back centuries and is perhaps most visible today in the arguments between evolution and creationism."

This seems apropos..."To believe in a supernatural god or universal spirit, people appear to suppress the brain network used for analytical thinking and engage the empathetic network, the scientists say. When thinking analytically about the physical world, people appear to do the opposite. When there's a question of faith, from the analytic point of view, it may seem absurd,"

said Tony Jack, who led the research.

"But, from what we understand about the brain, the leap of faith to belief in the supernatural amounts to pushing aside the critical/analytical way of thinking to help us achieve greater social and emotional insight."

Very edifying...https://phys.org/news/2016-03-conflict-science-religion-lies-brains.html

The article goes on...

Jack is an associate professor of philosophy at Case Western Reserve and research director of the university's Inamori International Center of Ethics and Excellence, which helped sponsor the research.

"A stream of research in cognitive psychology has shown and claims that people who have faith (i.e., are religious or spiritual) are not as smart as others. They actually might claim they are less intelligent.," said Richard Boyatzis, distinguished university professor and professor of organizational behavior at Case Western Reserve, and a member of Jack's team.

"Our studies confirmed that statistical relationship, but at the same time showed that people with faith are more prosocial and empathic," he said.

In a series of eight experiments, the researchers found **the more empathetic the person, the more likely he or she is religious.**

Interesting.

So I just checked, and can find nothing about objections to the scientific fact of species evolution being scientifically validated, and the theory that explains it falsified?

Has John posted these on any scientific forums? Only I can't find anything but ludicrous creationist propaganda that denies scientific facts?