Based on his comments, I understand that he thinks that without his Designer, the brain won't function to think since chemical reactions isn't enough to make someone think. In his illustration: "Suppose someone replaced a driver and this replacement doesn't know how to drive the vehicle, are you still going to ride the vehicle?" Hmmm… Seriously I don't think this "illustration" parallel the issue but...
...here's a shocker!
In a recent discovery, psychologists now know that the "brain wasn't designed to think." In short, the brain didn't started to be an organ used for thinking. Think about it for a second. There are allot of organisms that have a brain, yet they don't have the ability to think.
To understand how your brain actually works and what its most important job is, we have to go back about five hundred million years, in the Cambrian Period. This is the period when animals began actually hunting one another, which started an arms race of sorts between predators and prey.
So in this predator vs. prey environment, the brain's most important job is to run a budget for your body's energy efficiently, so that you can spend when you need to and save when you don't. This helps you survive and thrive, and ultimately, to perform nature’s most vital task: passing your genes on to the next generation.
And what about thinking? Thinking is loosely defined as the process of using one's mind to consider or reason about something. That is a very simple definition. Thinking is a process. We use it to solve a problem, to reason out, to make decisions, to form a category, to communicate, to form concepts, or to reflect an action. These are called cognition. Now, the process is not just brain chemistry. Thinking needs a lot more. In order to think, we must also have a good set of working memory, active senses - remember that our environment affects our thinking. You need nerve cells and brain chemicals that can detect information about the outside world and can transmit that information to other nerve cells. Also, cognitive functions depend on all parts of the brain working properly; when these systems become disrupted, thinking can be affected.
So, can you trust your thoughts?
Yes and No.
Thinking can be affected by your belief, concept or trust. Your emotions and personal belief like your politics, or religion can reshape your thinking ability. For example, if you deeply believed that extra-terrestrial aliens exist, and that aliens from outer space now live under the White House, you can easily think any strange lights that you see are "unidentified alien spacecrafts." Anaother example. Because of your religious belief, you "think" that the thinking process can only be achieve if the brain was "designed" to think.
Your education and intelligence can also alter the way you think. Example, people with lower intelligence are easily to accept false news and conspiracy theories compare to those who have higher intelligence.
Environment can also play with your thoughts, like how hallucinations can form in your head due to exposure in very hot weather. Optical illusions like mirages can be also a factor.
Your body also has some role in altering your way of thinking. Hunger and long sleep deprivation can cause hallucination and very bad judgment.
Chemicals like drugs, alcohol, or mental illness like dementia, paranoia and schizophrenia can also have an effect.
But with a well-trained, healthy mind, and some external help, we can trust our thinking ability.
So, that's it. These are chemical reactions inside and electrical activity in your brain, plus the external environment that makes you trust the way you think. The process is so natural; you don't need a so-called "Designer" to tinker your brain to get you thinking.
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