Embodied (Embrained?) Cognitive Evolution, at Last!

Abstract

It is time that brain size stops serving as a black box–type property of brains, “somehow” related to variations in cognitive performance across species. We now know that hidden behind similar brain structure sizes are diverse numbers of neurons and fibers that can differ in function according to experience and environment and that species differences are not a continuation of individual differences. Moving forward in understanding how cognitive evolution is linked to brain evolution requires acknowledging that, just like evolving brains are tied to evolving bodies, changing cognition comes from changing brains—and at multiple levels and timescales, which extend from inherited biological variation to experience and environmental influences that shape each individual brain and turn biological capabilities into actual abilities.