This is probably a crux; I think the brain does have tons of specialized architecture for it, and if I didn’t believe that, I probably wouldn’t think thought assessment was as difficult.
I think this is also a crux.
IMO, I think the brain is mostly cortically uniform, ala Steven Byrnes, and in particular I think that the specialized architecture for thought assessment was pretty minimal.
The big driver of human success is basically something like the bitter lesson applied to biological brains, combined with humans being very well optimized for tool use, such that they can over time develop technology that is used to dominate the world (it’s also helpful that humans can cooperate reasonably below 100 people, which is more than almost all social groups, though I’ve become much more convinced that cultural learning is way less powerful than Henrich et al have said).
(There are papers which show that humans are better at scaling neurons than basically everyone else, but I can’t find them right now).
I think this is also a crux.
IMO, I think the brain is mostly cortically uniform, ala Steven Byrnes, and in particular I think that the specialized architecture for thought assessment was pretty minimal.
The big driver of human success is basically something like the bitter lesson applied to biological brains, combined with humans being very well optimized for tool use, such that they can over time develop technology that is used to dominate the world (it’s also helpful that humans can cooperate reasonably below 100 people, which is more than almost all social groups, though I’ve become much more convinced that cultural learning is way less powerful than Henrich et al have said).
(There are papers which show that humans are better at scaling neurons than basically everyone else, but I can’t find them right now).