Good article, db. I would like to contribute a few comments on some of your points, so that you may consider questions that could come up as part of a presentation.

1. Dobrien is correct about the Easter Island example, and since this has been in the news recently, this may no longer want to be the example you wish to use.
2. Much was made (when I was a child) about the 'man does not evolve because he changes his environment' assertion. To the best of my knowledge, this is incorrect. The small genetic scope of the current human population is entirely due to the bottleneck we went through about 20-40K years ago - humans are currently mutating at the same or higher rate than other species (higher because of population density - whole discussion in itself).
3. Matt Ridley is among those who feel that biological evolution is just a 'case' in the general 'evolution of things' and that a pattern of innovation-and-subsequent-reduction is the rule rather than the exception in the physical world. This is a fascinating idea which other bright people have developed and which is very worth mentioning. 'Natural selection' also takes place amongst inventions/innovations, for example.
4. Other species, such as beavers, also change their environment to increase the available niches for their species. This is not unique to humans; humans are just very good at it.
5. Agriculture and dairy products could both be argued to have 'escaped the Malthusian trap' because they significantly increase the number of humans per unit area - for a time. What really does the trick, though, is to decrease the death rate of children and babies. When this happens, the birth rate spontaneously dives and humans are no longer out-reproducing their environment. (Singapore has a below-replacement birth rate; they are offering tax incentives for couples to have two or more children because their birth rate is so low.) So theoretically our species could have lowered the birth rate at the Secondary Animal Products point and still been at a Neolithic level of development. It was because we did not have the medical knowledge (the tech is really pretty basic) to do so that kept the birth rate high and forced us to innovate.

I very much liked your points about the (non) volition of plants, the fixed/marginal cost of a brain, and the non-sustainability of sustainability. Very nicely done.

Thank you for presenting this article to us.

Jan

Good stuff.
Socialism, creationism, and environmentalism demolished in one short paper.

Interesting paper . I have to disagree with your example of Easter Island. Recent studies have shown that the long standing belief that the Rapi Nuii committed ecological suicide is wrong. The current and most reasonable explanation for the deforestation of the native giant palm trees was rats that were either imported by the original Polynesian settlers or the hitched a ride. Rats double their population every 45 days. They became so plentiful and were such voracious eaters that they literally ate all the seeds of the trees as well as the roots of the saplings. The estimate of the 1st settlers is 900ad - 1200ad
Within less than 200 years the trees were gone!
When the island was discovered by the Dutch on Easter Sunday the trees were already gone. In addition the population was thriving , but the Dutch sailors left their mark and started the population crash .The cause was small pox ,
Venerial disease , influenza .When Capt Cook arrived 50 years later his crew repeated the unintentional onslaught of diseases ,estimates are 70 percent of the natives died from those 2 visits.
Reference "The statues that walked" by Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo

A very concise explanation of how biological evolution and Objectivism complement each other. I'd noticed it before but I've never seen a better paper on the subject. Bravo!

A superb demonstration of the positive worth of 'Open' Objectivism.
Well done db.
Txs.

Great article.
The left will never accept capitalism on any terms...not even your/Rand brilliantly relating it to nature...the left is anti-nature, anti life, anti reality.

Now I understand the confusion I caused when interjecting "Ethics" into a discussion of new technologies. Objectivist have a different understanding of that relationship.

Well done. Interesting and very informative analysis. It is consistent with my contention that while money is an invention the principals of economics are discoveries. They are as fundamental as the scientific discoveries of thermodynamics and Newtonian dynamics. Ignoring them is as dangerous as stepping off the roof of a twenty story building because you don't think the law of gravity applies to you.

Well done sir. And fine thinking besides. Thank you.

Good article, thanks

You might be interested, one writer to a much better writer...I've invented another word for intellectual...(which is more compartmentalized) instead, I've been using: intralectual (which would mean a more integrated form of intelect)

db
I appreciate your work and goal but need to point out some tidying up on your footnotes.
1. DNA does not determine what a cell does or how to do it. And Rand is not a source. Cells are not goal orientated. Just balance concentrations and do their thermodynamics . DNA codes for production of proteins based on information from the cell. The cellular processes allocate them. A classic example is a study showing a video of a cell forcing its way through intercellular space so narrow it leaves its nucleus with the DNA behind while it keeps on trucking.
3. You miss quote the article. Its vertebrates not mammals and the paper is about the scaling law of neuron density and how humans fit the law. The paper doesn't mention an important fact that hominid pelvic size openings control skull size. Brain density then has to make up for constrained volume. SO our high density of neurons makes us use more energy but its the price we pay for knowledge. Remember the human brain was intact long before speech.
Keep up the good work.

A very disappointing article. Please see my comment at the end of the source article.