Comments on: Science Tuesday: Social Animals http://www.chrisdellavedova.com/2007/09/18/science-tuesday-social-animals/ An American Expatriate -Upside Down Down Under Tue, 08 Sep 2009 07:10:34 -0600 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Jason http://www.chrisdellavedova.com/2007/09/18/science-tuesday-social-animals/comment-page-1/#comment-709 Jason Tue, 18 Sep 2007 22:57:14 +0000 http://www.chrisdellavedova.com/2007/09/18/science-tuesday-social-animals/#comment-709 As I'm sure you've heard many times before, its not actually the size that matters. If it was truly the size of the brain that dictates intelligence, then I'd imagine that whales would be the smartest creatures on earth, and perhaps dinosaurs would have been smart enough to survive (although I think I've heard that their brains were pretty small. Its all relative though). There are two main things to consider when reading such information. First, its easy to equate the brain with intellect or cognitive ability but this would be inappropriate. Like most other organs, the brain has many parts with specialized functions. Only a fraction of the brain is actually devoted to cognition and higher-order processing, or "smartness". Other areas of the brain are largely involved in maintaining the overall functioning of the body, to describe it very simply, and can be broken down into dozens upon dozens of jobs. So, just using brain size to determine smartness isn't really fair. Secondly, since brain size doesn't seem to matter in comparison to whales, elephants, etc., the big difference between a human brain and other brains is the "wrinkling" that is typical on the surface of the cortex. Other species don't have this feature, or at least not nearly to the same extent. Its this wrinkling feature that greatly increases surface area. The surface of the brain, or the "gray matter" is where most cognitive ability takes place and with exponentially increased surface area comes exponentially increased cognitive ability. I should probably read the article you mention. I'm sure I could have something to say about it and it sounds like an interesting study, but I think I'd rather spend my time on deciding whether or not to pick up DeShawn Wynn for my fantasy team. On a related note, in response to Matt's statement above about women selecting for men that were clever or wittier, that topic always seems to come up in evolutionary discussions but I can't see how its really true these days. When someone like Kevin Federline has already spawned 5 kids yet most of the smartest people in the world never come even close to this number in their lifetime, doesn't it seem like we've evolved to a point where we are (as a society) working AGAINST evolution? And finally, this post reminded me of when I was in high school and I was on a visit to Cornell. I recall walking through one of the science buildings on a tour and we walked past this display of human brains preserved in large jars. The interesting thing about that tour was that I learned that the largest human brains ever examined at Cornell belonged to serial killers and other deranged sociopaths. Now what does that tell you about brain size? As I’m sure you’ve heard many times before, its not actually the size that matters. If it was truly the size of the brain that dictates intelligence, then I’d imagine that whales would be the smartest creatures on earth, and perhaps dinosaurs would have been smart enough to survive (although I think I’ve heard that their brains were pretty small. Its all relative though). There are two main things to consider when reading such information.

First, its easy to equate the brain with intellect or cognitive ability but this would be inappropriate. Like most other organs, the brain has many parts with specialized functions. Only a fraction of the brain is actually devoted to cognition and higher-order processing, or “smartness”. Other areas of the brain are largely involved in maintaining the overall functioning of the body, to describe it very simply, and can be broken down into dozens upon dozens of jobs. So, just using brain size to determine smartness isn’t really fair.

Secondly, since brain size doesn’t seem to matter in comparison to whales, elephants, etc., the big difference between a human brain and other brains is the “wrinkling” that is typical on the surface of the cortex. Other species don’t have this feature, or at least not nearly to the same extent. Its this wrinkling feature that greatly increases surface area. The surface of the brain, or the “gray matter” is where most cognitive ability takes place and with exponentially increased surface area comes exponentially increased cognitive ability.

I should probably read the article you mention. I’m sure I could have something to say about it and it sounds like an interesting study, but I think I’d rather spend my time on deciding whether or not to pick up DeShawn Wynn for my fantasy team.

On a related note, in response to Matt’s statement above about women selecting for men that were clever or wittier, that topic always seems to come up in evolutionary discussions but I can’t see how its really true these days. When someone like Kevin Federline has already spawned 5 kids yet most of the smartest people in the world never come even close to this number in their lifetime, doesn’t it seem like we’ve evolved to a point where we are (as a society) working AGAINST evolution?

And finally, this post reminded me of when I was in high school and I was on a visit to Cornell. I recall walking through one of the science buildings on a tour and we walked past this display of human brains preserved in large jars. The interesting thing about that tour was that I learned that the largest human brains ever examined at Cornell belonged to serial killers and other deranged sociopaths. Now what does that tell you about brain size?

]]> By: Matthew http://www.chrisdellavedova.com/2007/09/18/science-tuesday-social-animals/comment-page-1/#comment-708 Matthew Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:48:48 +0000 http://www.chrisdellavedova.com/2007/09/18/science-tuesday-social-animals/#comment-708 About 3 or 4 years ago, I read a theory that I thought was quite creative. The argument was that we have a big brain through run away sexual selection (similar to the peacock tail). That women would select for men that were cleaver or wittier or what have you for mating purposes. I did a quick Google search, but didn't find much. I can't remember the person who came up with this, but the results mentioned above kind of fits in with that hypothesis. About 3 or 4 years ago, I read a theory that I thought was quite creative. The argument was that we have a big brain through run away sexual selection (similar to the peacock tail). That women would select for men that were cleaver or wittier or what have you for mating purposes. I did a quick Google search, but didn’t find much. I can’t remember the person who came up with this, but the results mentioned above kind of fits in with that hypothesis.

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