Q&A: Plantinga and Evolution
Plantinga and Evolution
Question
You cited Plantinga in The Science of Freedom as saying that there is no evolutionary advantage to cognitive ability over instinctive behavior.
I thought cognition does have an advantage in that: A) it is more compact and does not need to contain countless specific solutions to specific problems. B) it can adapt to new conditions or surprising challenges. Dawkins argues in The Selfish Gene (when he tries to explain consciousness with such a silly and empty argument that I’m left only to wonder how he became so famous — exactly like Yuval Noah Harari) that the enormous leap in survival ability came from the ability to run “imagination” simulations, and thus weigh risks without actually taking them — that too justifies cognition. (He tries to say there that at some stage the simulation platform became so broad that it had to include a model of itself, and from there came self-awareness {he means unconscious mentality as a line of code in the simulation machine}… an argument I wouldn’t expect from an elementary school student.)
What do you think?
Answer
I don’t think you’re right. Even if there is cognition, it can be viewed on the physical plane as neural processes. The only question is whether cognition accompanies that. And in general, adding cognition is itself a kind of complication, so it would already be preferable just to complicate the neurons. Above all, for materialists there is no difference at all between the two possibilities. Cognition takes place by means of the neurons and emerges from them.
Discussion on Answer
Already answered.
Passing along from a parallel question:
I remembered that Plantinga was talking about the reliability of cognition, not just about whether or not it has an advantage.
Still, one could say that countless instincts may be unreliable, but cognition (which, as noted, does have an evolutionary advantage) is far more likely to be reliable, so that it can be coherent and consistently explain a wide range of different phenomena. And it isn’t endlessly complicated, so it can remain consistent despite its inaccuracy. As is well known, lies have no legs. As someone once said: “I have no problem living a double life; I get tangled up in the third and fourth ones.”