Jul 30, 2021 08:11 PM
Big brains may have helped birds survive dinosaur-killing asteroid
https://www.insidescience.org/news/big-b...g-asteroid
BLURB: A fossil skull from a bird that lived in the time of dinosaurs sheds light on how the ancestors of modern birds escaped extinction. .. (MORE)
Can a bigger brain be engineered?
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/...engineered
KEY POINTS: Research suggests greater intelligence comes from our experience of a changing world and our ability to adapt to it. One study showed fish that experienced a changing world performed substantially better on cognitive tasks than those reared on constant ration. If a young organism can be flexible when faced with new conditions around them, they may achieve higher cognitive abilities as adults.
EXCERPTS: In Parts 1 and 2 of this series on brain size and intelligence, I discussed how brain size on its own tells us little about intelligence and behavioral complexity both within and across species, and I pointed out that human brains have, in fact, been shrinking over the past 30,000 years.
But you could object to these arguments by pointing out that they are retrospective: the evidence I cited compares brains from the past and in different species. In other words, the relevant data are not from experiments in a strict sense, where a scientist interacts directly with the system under study—the brain in this case—and manipulates it somehow.
Scientifically, we would like to perform an experiment where we can engineer bigger brains and measure performance on cognitive tests for manipulated individuals compared to control brains that have not been manipulated, or compared to individuals engineered to have smaller brains.
We obviously can't (and shouldn't) do this in humans, but it has been achieved in other species. A series of experiments where fish are bred to have larger brains have been performed by evolutionary biologists Alexander Kotrschal, Niclas Kolm, and colleagues in Sweden and elsewhere.
These studies have produced curious results. In a 2013 study, selective breeding over just a few generations produces large-brained individuals with 5-10% more brain mass than those bred to have smaller brains. Do the lucky big-brained fish get smarter?
[...] in these guppies, at least, males seem to benefit little, if at all, from having a bigger brain. Females might benefit, but we can't necessarily extrapolate this possible sex difference to humans since guppy males and females differ much more than human males and females (sexual dimorphism).
The authors conclude, cautiously, that there are “costs and benefits” to having a bigger brain.
But another study by Kotrschal and evolutionary biologist Barbara Taborsky points to something potentially more important than brain size that can be usefully associated with intelligence: the environment we are surrounded by. The idea is that greater intelligence comes from our experience of a changing world and our ability to adapt to it. In other words, if an organism can be flexible and innovative when faced with new conditions around them, especially when they are young, they may achieve higher cognitive abilities as adults... (MORE - missing details)
https://www.insidescience.org/news/big-b...g-asteroid
BLURB: A fossil skull from a bird that lived in the time of dinosaurs sheds light on how the ancestors of modern birds escaped extinction. .. (MORE)
Can a bigger brain be engineered?
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/...engineered
KEY POINTS: Research suggests greater intelligence comes from our experience of a changing world and our ability to adapt to it. One study showed fish that experienced a changing world performed substantially better on cognitive tasks than those reared on constant ration. If a young organism can be flexible when faced with new conditions around them, they may achieve higher cognitive abilities as adults.
EXCERPTS: In Parts 1 and 2 of this series on brain size and intelligence, I discussed how brain size on its own tells us little about intelligence and behavioral complexity both within and across species, and I pointed out that human brains have, in fact, been shrinking over the past 30,000 years.
But you could object to these arguments by pointing out that they are retrospective: the evidence I cited compares brains from the past and in different species. In other words, the relevant data are not from experiments in a strict sense, where a scientist interacts directly with the system under study—the brain in this case—and manipulates it somehow.
Scientifically, we would like to perform an experiment where we can engineer bigger brains and measure performance on cognitive tests for manipulated individuals compared to control brains that have not been manipulated, or compared to individuals engineered to have smaller brains.
We obviously can't (and shouldn't) do this in humans, but it has been achieved in other species. A series of experiments where fish are bred to have larger brains have been performed by evolutionary biologists Alexander Kotrschal, Niclas Kolm, and colleagues in Sweden and elsewhere.
These studies have produced curious results. In a 2013 study, selective breeding over just a few generations produces large-brained individuals with 5-10% more brain mass than those bred to have smaller brains. Do the lucky big-brained fish get smarter?
[...] in these guppies, at least, males seem to benefit little, if at all, from having a bigger brain. Females might benefit, but we can't necessarily extrapolate this possible sex difference to humans since guppy males and females differ much more than human males and females (sexual dimorphism).
The authors conclude, cautiously, that there are “costs and benefits” to having a bigger brain.
But another study by Kotrschal and evolutionary biologist Barbara Taborsky points to something potentially more important than brain size that can be usefully associated with intelligence: the environment we are surrounded by. The idea is that greater intelligence comes from our experience of a changing world and our ability to adapt to it. In other words, if an organism can be flexible and innovative when faced with new conditions around them, especially when they are young, they may achieve higher cognitive abilities as adults... (MORE - missing details)