I asked my friend what she thought about your comment and this was her response:
" This guy just has old information, although he is saying stuff that we believed within the last ten years. Here are two main points on which I would contend with him, based on recent research:
- The idea that the primary difference between human brains and non-human brains is our “overdeveloped” neocortex has been highly questioned lately. As of the last 5 years, there is strong evidence that the human brain is a scaled up primate brain:
1. Azevedo, F. A., Carvalho, L. R., Grinberg, L. T., Farfel, J. M., Ferretti, R. E., Leite, R. E., ... & HerculanoHouzel, S. (2009). Equal numbers of neuronal and nonneuronal cells make the human brain an isometrically scaledup primate brain. Journal of Comparative Neurology, 513, 532-541.
2. Herculano-Houzel, S. (2009). The human brain in numbers: a linearly scaled-up primate brain. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 3, 31.
- The idea that humans don’t experience much neurogenesis outside of older structures in the brain. Of course it depends on what you consider “old,” but the point is that humans show neurogenesis throughout their lifespan across the brain. However, in defence of the commenter’s point, this is indeed a hotly debated area, especially as to whether primates don’t show neurogenesis in adulthood (see the third citation below):
1. Eriksson, P. S., Perfilieva, E., Björk-Eriksson, T., Alborn, A. M., Nordborg, C., Peterson, D. A., & Gage, F. H. (1998). Neurogenesis in the adult human hippocampus. Nature medicine, 4, 1313-1317.
2. Jin, K., Wang, X., Xie, L., Mao, X. O., Zhu, W., Wang, Y., ... & Greenberg, D. A. (2006). Evidence for stroke-induced neurogenesis in the human brain.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 103, 13198-13202.
3. Rakic, P. (2002). Neurogenesis in adult primate neocortex: an evaluation of the evidence. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 3, 65-71.
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