Along those lines, I think the bigger brain is needed to move bigger limbs around, more electric power to signal the muscles but I haven’t been able to find a citation.
I think that’s what Douglas_Knight was getting at with the “controlling muscle… needn’t clog up the brain” comment. If the trouble is that muscles need a amplified electrical signal, why not send data from a small efficient brain down small efficient nerves then amplify those signals right next to the muscle?
There’s probably some design constraint we don’t see, though. Whales have much bigger brains than humans, but those brains seem to be composed of fewer neurons and far far more glial cells...
Along those lines, I think the bigger brain is needed to move bigger limbs around, more electric power to signal the muscles but I haven’t been able to find a citation.
I think that’s what Douglas_Knight was getting at with the “controlling muscle… needn’t clog up the brain” comment. If the trouble is that muscles need a amplified electrical signal, why not send data from a small efficient brain down small efficient nerves then amplify those signals right next to the muscle?
There’s probably some design constraint we don’t see, though. Whales have much bigger brains than humans, but those brains seem to be composed of fewer neurons and far far more glial cells...