Evolutionists - How do you explain "Gifts"?

Question

Such as a 4 year old seeing a piano for the first time and immediately start playing a masterpiece, creating a work of art, etc.? No one in their family has ever played the piano or painted, or whatever.
I'm not trying to start a nasty debate...just want your view on something I have a hard time grasping about your beliefs. I like to learn about what others think about the world we live in.
Thanks.

John C - Come on man, that's what dolphins do, they swim when they're born...that's normal. A toddler playing a masterpiece on the piano is not normal.

Andy - Here are a couple of examples:
Treffert admits to science's complete bafflement over this phenomenon. No wonder, for how can we, in our present state of knowledge, account of these two cases:

Twin savants who can instantly name the day of the week over a span of 8000 years, and who may have an unlimited digital span; i.e., an unlimited memory for numbers.

Blind Tom, possessing a very lim ited IQ, who played Mozart on the piano at 4, and who could play back flawlessly any piece of music, re gardless of complexity. He could also repeat a discourse of any length in any language without the loss of a syllable.
(Treffert, Darold A.; "The Idiot Savant: A Review of the Syndrome," American Journal of Psychiatry, 145: 563, 1988.)
Just because you don't have anything intelligent to say about it, doesn't mean it's false.

Boca - I'm not sure what you're saying...So, Motzart's brain evolved? His family's did? His great, great, great, grandfather was just an OK composer, and his son was a little better, and so on? I hope that's not what you're saying.

Answer 1

Human "talents" fall in a bell curve. You've got most people in the average section, a few people in the below average section, a few people in the above average section, a few people in the way below average section, and a few people in the way above average section. It's called the "Normal Range of Human Variation." It's not "gifts" as in someone was singled out for special treatment by a divine being.

Consider the corollary. Such as a 4 year old who cannot mentally function on his or her own. Application of the scientific method and, yes, evolutionary theory, puts this four year old as a normal human. Creationism singles this four year old out for special treatment by taking away "gifts" that the average person has.

If you look beyond the single four year old to the full range of variation, you won't find it an oddity or something that can only be explained supernaturally. The gifted four year old is actually scientifically necessary. If no gifted children existed, if there were a maximum level of intelligence or talent, that would be unnatural. Variation curves resemble hills, not cliffs. If there is a cliff, that indicates something unnatural to the population is taking place.

Your gifted four year old is actually more evidence of non-divine intervention than it is evidence of divine intervention.

Answer 2

When technology says "threat" it approach both that the causal mechanisms are unknown or that they're some thing instead of what was once being proven. For illustration, the p significance of a outcome is the probability that it occurred as a result of a few affect instead of what was once being studied, which would be a few affect we do not even but recognize approximately. "Chance," in different phrases, is a position marker crucial for correctly representing inductive uncertainty. My perception in threat, on this feel, isn't established on technology, however on an expertise of the character and bounds of human commentary, and arithmetic. Natural determination isn't established on "threat." Physics units limits on how chemical substrates can mix and difference, frequently established on geometry and cost. The atmosphere comes to a decision the pressures and help an organism can have, and the chemistry comes to a decision what variety of responses are feasible. Actual randomness might don't have any such constraints. edit: If that had been real, it would now not be a incontrovertible fact that some thing is unknown.

Answer 3

Savants have been around since the beginning of time. Motzart was giving violin concerts when he was 5 and composing when he was 6. It has to do with the way the brain is wired, one of those evolution things.

Answer 4

Skills in painting, music, etc. are not inheritable. The son of a musician who plays Chopin at age 4 is just as amazing as the son of a plumber.

Evolution doesn't claim to explain everything. In fact, it only explains a handful of narrow things. As humans we like to expand the theory of evolution beyond what it was intended to describe, but in reality it's just a simple little theory.

Evolution says nothing for or against miracles or acts of God.

Answer 5

My question to you is, do you think god did it?

Because if god can give a child a gift like that, why can't he stop another child from being born with cancer, or a lost limb, or blind, or deaf, or retarded?

If god gets involved with one child, he must accept responsibility for all children - isn't that the right thing to do, especially for a loving god?

Or can you explain why god would give a child a gift but not let another just be born normal?

Saying god gave this child a gift brings up many other questions for me

Actually, there is a scientific explanation for it, it's the same syndrome that causes autism, it's just not as severe

Answer 6

Proof, or it never happened.


Ok,

There are very rare people called savants, or more correctly 'idiot savants', who are mentally retarded except for one very narrow ability, usually it involves seeing or hearing something once or twice and then with very little time in between doing a reasonable facsimile of the piece. It has been studied intensly and it is understood by science.

That is a FAR cry from what you are describing, with naturally not a shred of evidence to back it up.

Answer 7

"Such as a 4 year old seeing a piano for the first time and immediately start playing a masterpiece, creating a work of art,"

With all due respect, you are exaggerating.

Mozart's first compositions, a small Andante (K. 1a) and Allegro (K. 1b), were written in 1761, when he was five years old, but they are hardly masterpieces.

Answer 8

What on earth could that have to do with evolution? Even if it were proved that God stepped in and gave that child that gift -- it doesn't mean that men have not evolved. Belief in religious miracles and belief in evolution are not mutually exclusive. In fact -- there are many who think that evolution IS a religious miracle.

Answer 9

Savants and idiot savants have been described by medical literature for quite some time.

As for 4 year olds, if you are referring to prodigies, they don't play masterpieces at that age. Mozart composed at four, but it was no masterpiece.

I don't think any religious explanation has ever been taken seriously.

Answer 10

I'm catholic and I accept evolution - I don't like your term though - and I don't really understand what you're asking. The human mind evolved into a wonderful instrument, I don't see talent as proving anything, one way or the other