Persistent Problems in the Evolution of Mind

Abstract

Some of the problems discussed herein are: origin of mind, nature of behavioral evolution, correlation of behavior with the evolution of the nervous system, variation and functional regulation in the nervous system. As yet we have only a vague notion of neural mechanisms which produce an organization of behavior. At the level of simple perception a start has been made toward understanding the principles of integration in terms of the properties of a lattice of interacting nerve cells. The student of behavioral evolution must deal with gene variation and the resultant changes in brain structure, and then with behavior. Progress toward an understanding of the evolution of behavior depends on our ability to analyze the properties of the nerve net and to discover the phylo-genetic differences in its structure.