Re: >H NEURO/IA: "Brain Not Evolving Any Time Soon"
James Rogers (jamesr@best.com)
Tue, 28 Jan 1997 01:29:38 -0800
At 10:44 PM 1/27/97 -0800, E. Shaun Russell wrote:
>On 28/01/97 (Aussie time...always ahead of us!), Mitchell forwarded:
>>
>>This article comes from the Health section of Yahoo's Reuters pages
>>(January 27; articles there lapse after a week).
>>
>>Brain Not Evolving Any Time Soon
>
>><big snip of how the brain isn't getting any bigger>
>
>
> So the brain isn't getting bigger. So what? The brain has stayed
>the same size for thousands of years; what hasn't stayed the same is how
>people use their brains. Those who are geniuses are as such because they
>try to maximize their potential. But considering that very little of our
>brain is actually used for thought processes etc., there is little doubt in
>my mind (pun intended) that there is much room for evolutionary improvement.
>Many people who have partial lobectomies and\or lobotomies are still very
>intelligent, though theoretically, the area of their brains are smaller. In
>the same effect, most half-wits have a normal sized brain. In the end, it's
>not the size that counts, but how you use it. ;~)
There was a sidebar in a psychology book I once read about a 19th century
Englishman who died of cancer or something quite suddenly. His long-time
friend, a doctor, did the autopsy and was amazed to discover that his friend
was missing the vast majority of one the hemispheres in his brain. There
was nothing about the man's behavior or intelligence that would have
suggested that he was missing nearly half of his brain.
Obviously architecture is more important than size. Ten million transistors
does not equal a computer.
-James Rogers
jamesr@best.com