Sublime

Brain circuitry operates by the many-to-one principle of degeneracy: instances of a single emotion category, such as fear, are handled by different brain patterns at different times and in different people. Conversely, the same neurons can participate in creating different mental states (one-to-many).

What molds our brain? Experience. Even into old age, our experiences actually change the physical structure of the brain. When we undergo an experience, our brain cells—called neurons—become active, or “fire.” The brain has one hundred billion

One source of evidence is work by Suzana Herculano-Houzel, a neuroscientist who has dissolved the brains of many creatures to determine how many neurons are present. She’s found a lot of interesting scaling laws. She has a paper discussing the human brain as a scaled-up primate brain.60 Across a wide variety of animals, mammals in particular, there