From: Nicholas Bostrom (bostrom@mail.ndirect.co.uk)
Date: Sat Sep 27 1997 - 17:23:11 MDT
The Low Golden Willow wrote:
> A large brain may require a large body, but by what I've skimmed from
> Churchland a large body might well need a large brain to function.
> There's a distorted map of your skin on the surface of your brain. More
> skin, more map.
I have often heard this argument, but I think it is wrong. Processing
of tactile information takes up only a small fraction the cortex.
Therefore, if we double body area, or the number of tactile
receptors, and if we assume that this requires that tactile sensory
cortex also doubles, this will mean that the total brain size only
goes up by a percent or so.
------------------------------------------------
Nicholas Bostrom
bostrom@ndirect.co.uk
*Visit my transhumanist web site at*
http://www.hedweb.com/nickb
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