Why does man have such a large fleshy brain organ?

A Question

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The human brain seems to be useless. Animals have different kinds of organs. Most of them it is easy to find the function of it. An octopus has large tentacles for grabbing crabs, and swimming. A sperm whale has a gigantic fatty head, that focuses soundwaves into a sonic ray gun to stun squids and eat them! (its true) Many organs are simple like this. Legs are for walking. Hands are for grabbing. Teeth are for grinding. Penises are for fucking.

Furthermore, nature usually does not give an organ for no reason. If she did, a similar animal without the organ would do the same job, with less waste. That creature would have an evolutionary advantage. A significant portion of a human beings bloodflow goes to the brains. Shit, what is going on in there? Must be something important. Maybe the brain helps us process our waste products? Or maybe it stores excess fatty tissue that would otherwise go straight to our thighs.

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Even more dubious is the claim that brains are for 'consciousness' and 'intelligence'. I simply don't see that happening. Don't we have souls? And what about all those cute critters, don't they have souls too? And what about the universal consciousness? Aren't we a part of that? My mother tells me that god gives these things. Not only that, but that the soul is in the heart, and not in the head.

Thanks for all your responses.

 

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Wow the brain is useless! I guess humans made tool just because of the opposable thumb, no thought was need! Human invented things increasing their capacity to gather food and prospered... all thanks to the thumb and nothing more! Human dominate the planet, overthrowing all other natural predators and wildlife to make room and food for them selves… all thanks to the thumb and nothing more!

Question, is this irony or sarcasm?

 

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-Bob-,

Ye'r joking, right?

Um . . . The brain kinda runs all yer bodily functions . . . even the involuntary ones.

Why don't ya?

We (and some of those critters too) are conscious. That is kinda what a soul is, in my opinion.

Please elaborate on what ya mean by "universal consciousness".

That's the religious viewpoint. It's different from the scientific viewpoint.

Ye'r welcome!

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No you don't get it. The soul does all that crap. And the thumbs too. Not only that, but the upright walking stance.

I wonder.

If the brainflesh is so useless, maybe I could have an operation to remove it and put in some cupholders? I could fit at least two beer cans in there, and eliminate the middleman!

 

:bugeye:

This is a serious matter, Athelwulf. Don't for a second think I am not treating it with the utmost of seriousness.

the brain stem runs the involuntary functions. That is actually a small part of the brain no bigger than a wallnut dude. But souls do most of the dirty work.

How do you explain then, scientists measuring slight changes in weight at the time of death?

And that guy on tv who talks to the dead?

plus the existence of souls is proven by this webpage.

http://xoomer.virgilio.it/fedeescienza/englishnf

Souls exist. Therefore souls do the work of intelligence and consciousness. Therefore brainflesh is useless.

 

Well, according to some, brains are for fucking too.

Oh? So, the peacock's tail has a reason?


Hmmm. Just refreshed the page and see that this has taken an altogether.... odd turn.

The soul?

You've just removed all the taste that I have for replying to this thread but I will make at least an attempt.

If this is what you think, then by all means crack your skull and let that useless brainflesh out. Hell, scoop it out with an ice cream scoop and fry it up. Lots of protein in there.


Blegh. Your talk of souls brings a bad taste to my mouth. This is in the wrong forum.


Ok. One last for those who are saying that the brain has a purpose. Consider this.
One. Nature has no reason. It just is.
Two. The brain didn't evolve for tool use. It didn't evolve for language. It didn't evolve for most of the things we now use it for. Saying it does is like saying that computers were invented to browse the internet and looking at porn.

Ok. That's it.
Get thee behind me, Satan.

I'm outro.

 

I am interested in this theory. How do I use my brain for fucking? My ears are too small for a penis to fit through. I can fit a penis in my mouth, but that still does not reach my brain. Do women find my excess of brainflesh attractive, and want to fuck me repeatedly and lick my balls because of it? I doubt that.

Sure does dude. For fucking.

Protein? There's a lot of fat there too. If a brain is only to store excess fatty tissue, It might make me fatter. Or it might just go back up there.

Maybe theres something else in your mouth giving the bad taste.

What did it evolve for then? Clearly hands are for grabbing, and penises are for fucking. Though I try; I cannot use my penis to grab things. Nor can I use it to grind things. Some organs do serve two purposes, though. Case in point: the asshole.

If nature "just is", and the brain "just is", doesn't that mean its just a useless lump of fatty flesh, like I said? I wonder why you are arguing to prove my own point. Thank you for responding though, it amuses me.

 

I'll ask again and elaborate: is this thread irony or sarcasm?

 

Mr. Fetus. Why do you insist on asking such questions? Even if I am being ironic as you suppose, it detracts from the issue at hand.

I am yet to hear a proper justification, for this insignificant, fatty and rather ugly organ you call the brain. All the answers I have recieved fall short of the mark in my opinion.

 

Bob,

I think we all know the answer, but you don’t seem to accept it, why do you believe the brain has no importance when vast amounts of evidence point to its function being critical to thinking, reasoning, perceiving and consciousness. Are you being ironic or just a kook?

 

Mr. Fetus.

Plenty of other people believe as I do, therefore I am not a kook. If there's evidence, please give it to me. I am waiting patiently. As I said- thinking, reasoning, percieving and consciousness are functions of the soul. The soul survives after death. Therefore the soul is not produced by functions of the brains.

 

So then why does damage to the brain corrupt, deplete or even remove these functions? If it were a function of the soul and not the brain then damage to the brain would not cause these problems. As you hinted at the brain would have be for some other function, a function that we haven't figured out according to you, yet should be horrible obvious considering that 1/3 of all the energy the human body consumes goes to the brain.

and please just call me Fetus

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By the way a small minority if people believing and advocating intensively in something that the rest agree is stupid or insane, still lets them be label kooks.

 

The rumour that humans only use 10% of the brain is bull; we use the entire brain. Thus it is quite useful and can't be made smaller.

Proove that there is such a thing as a soul and then we'll see, k? Please don't refer to deities and religious beliefs, those are even more debatable.

PS. I'm really excited about the proof of soul's existence.

Edit: if you wish to make your brain smaller, I advise requesting a frontal lobotomy

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Fetus, you claim that brain damage corrupts or removes these functions. Really? Lets see.

Certain people are stupider than others, yes. But people with larger brains are not smarter, it has been shown. Why? Try explaining that one. You can't. Your precious science fails you now, doesn't it? Hah!

Not only that, but as I stated before thinking is an action performed by the soul. How come when people flatline, and their brain stops functioning, they come back and report experiences from beyond the grave? As I stated before there is plenty of proof for the existence of a soul. How could a soul exist, and not think, percieve or do other crap like that?

Sure, you think its horribly obvious. But I don't, and neither does a large portion of humanity. So that doesn't cut it, my friend.

This may come as a surprise to you, but I have smoked marijuana, crack and dust before, and also I've ingested LSD, Ecstasy pills, and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Not to mention the occasional sixpack of beers. Now these substances obviously affect the brainflesh, and kill brain cells (a lot of them). But I feel fine. How then is it that my brainy tissue is the cause of this thinking?

But a good explanation for all this brain damage crap would be if the brain were some kind of seat for the soul. Maybe, its a place where the soul and the flesh interact. So perhaps damage to the brain doesn't really affect our thinking, percieving of the soul, but rather affects how much of it actually gets translated into the physical world. So then the body would sort of like weigh down the soul, and then it gets free when we die.

But studies have shown that if certain sectors of the brain are damaged, the human goes on like normal. I am living proof of this.

Your definition of "Kooks" is horrible. It would have included, at one time, the people who though the earth was round (when everyone believed it was flat, silly fucks).

Besides, a significant portion of the human race believes in life after death. You are the kook, my friend. Not me.

 

Actually, the opposite has been shown.

But who am I kidding, you're just trolling.

 

where?

Einstein, and many other leading scientists contrary to popular opinion did not have larger brains than everyone else.

I think they took Einsteins brain and studied it after he died (hah! talk about an excercise in futility). Some guy even wrote a book about it.

 

Try, um, reading the posts I wrote? I already gave a link to the proof of the soul, dude. Maybe then you will read it and understand why I am 'trolling'.

 

I looked at the link, it looked awfully weird and short, no complete sentences.
Please be so kind as to recite major points and link me to scientific studies you mentioned.

Also, please recall all of the processes taking place in the brain and effects of such operations as frontal lobotomy (I mentioned it for a reason). How do you fit that into your soul theory?

 

Bob,

I’m a little drunk now so I hope I make sense, it seems ethanol molecules are interfering with my synapsea firing between neurons, reduce function and motor skills. I have to think more slowly to try to organize my thoughts to compensate for signal lose due to the ethanol. Thank god for Microsoft word and the long delay times to forum posting.

Brain size does not necessarily mean smarter, rather the density of neuron networking in the cerebral cortex means smarter.

Afterlife experience have been explained by sporadic firing of neurons after death, and even more so by the massive non-ionic (thus not detectable by ETG) induce release of endorphins brought on by oxygen depravation; this gives the morphine like sense of calm and peace. Also the light at the end of the tunnel seen is cause by oxygen deprivation of the retina and optical nerve which cause the illusion of a bright point of light and blackness around, test pilots in G-force tests report the same thing when blacking out.

Brain cells store memory and skills through networking which makes memory and skill stored in a highly redundant matrix, when one cell dies it functions can be ignored and replaced, when cells die in a network they can be circumnavigated. A study was conducted on rats train to run through a maze, then varying amount of cortex was removed, it took a surprising amount of cortex to be removed before the rats could not remember how to run through the maze, the part to remember was that after shearing way enough cortex the rats did forget how to run the maze, any damage of cortex does have a much greater effects on how to learn to run a maze though and on details of memory. An artist once came out of car accident with brain damage to a specific section of brain that interpreted color. Try as he might he could not see colors anymore, everything was gray, he tried to imagine a orange, but all he could image was a gray fruit, to him all perception of color was lost, he knew red, green and blue should exist from what he told, but everything he could see or dream of was gray.

Two theories exist then, the brain is the center of thought and all thought exist physically, or thought uses a physical vessel in such a way as to be undistinguishable from being strictly physical, yet exist metaphysically. One of these theories is simpler and more likely, it removes a step, a step that is based on no evidence, as step that for all practical purposes is a waste of time, and toe believe it that step is faith, and not science. Copernicus came out with a mathematical algorithm that predicted planet motion with the sun as the center and not the earth, yet Copernicus’s theorem had to compete with a convoluted theorem used to predict the planets motion based as the earth as the center. Both systems could predict the planets motion with some accuracy, though many astronomers were bought by the easy of calculation of Copernicus’s theorem, it was a much similar answer. The simplest answer is more likely to be correct.

Studies have show that in rare cases usually children (who can train other parts of the brain to take over task that damaged section did with much greater success the adults.) can go on living life almost normal. In most cases thought the damage is a detriment of easy detection and study. And unless you have medical evidence that you have significant damage to your brain, your not living proof. Pot and magic mushrooms are not proof unless you have a MRI photo of your brain with big holes in it!

Those that thought the world was round based their ideas on science and philosophies that allowed them to come to those conclusion with evidence and logic. Kooks base their ideas opposite to occam's razor, base their ideas on mythologies, choose evidence that is usually not validated and against a mass of counter evidence.

When proclaiming an idea science yet basing it on religion or pseudoscience, that is being a kook. Many believe in life after death but that is outside of the range of discussion of science, science has yet to prove such a thing, it is simply faith to believe it now, thus theology and religion, not science. If you want to talk about the soul then religion sub-forum would have been better. Discussing it here is being a kook.

 

It dosn't shock me in the least. In fact, I think it explains some things.

Well, in that case why can certain types of brain damage cause loss of memory or personality changes? It would suggest that the processing device, not the output, is damaged.

not all parts are necessary and some parts are redundant, acting as backups just in case some damage occurs. Would you even notice a change?

And for that matter, if you were to be controlled by a noncoporeal soul as opposed to ball of interconnected cells firing chemical and electrical signals to each other, why should booze or drugs make you drunk or high? A soul should be untouchable by such things.