Can a head with the same size of ant's accomodate a super brain that's smarter than human's??

Question

Why?? Is the amount of cells vital in this aspect? Can cells be limitlessly tinier

Answer 1

No, for the exact reason you mentioned.

Cells have a specific size and most brain cells are the same size in any creature. The cell has evolved to be as efficient as possible so shrinking it down any more would be difficult if not impossible.

All cells use a similar structure and design that takes up a similar space. Like the atom the basic cells are as efficient and as small as possible.

The reason for a human child's long childhood and why the brain grows after death and why the child's skull is not fully formed is because the human baby's head has reached the largest size it can and still be able to fit through the birth canal.

The difference between many of the smaller animals and the larger ones is due to the brain size. Reptiles don't need a lot of brain matter so they have small brains. The dinosaurs were reptiles so their brains didn't have to be very large. The alligator and crocodile are very successful species with little change since the dinosaurs; because they are about the best that they can be. They have reached a point where further evolution isn't necessary to exploit the environment where they live. The most dangerous predator to an alligator is another alligator. Once they have grown to a decent size they are at the apex of the food chain and all others fear them. Without the pressure of environment that creates a NEED for a change, change doesn’t happen.

We share over 95% of our DNA with the great apes, yet we are very different creatures. The primary difference is the brain size. Our loss of hair is an evolutionary response to the use of clothing, so we don’t need as much body hair as the apes do. Without that drain to produce all that hair the body can use those nutrients to develop other systems.

Ants not only lack the brain cells, but the size of the cranium to support large brains. In fact, an individual ant is very stupid and wouldn’t survive long. They need the colony to survive; only the queen can reproduce. Soldiers are so specialized that in many species they have to be feed by workers, they can’t eat themselves. So the ant’s development is limited by their body size.

A larger ant could be a smarter ant. The cube square law holds only for the body support structure not the brains. When you square the size of a body you need to cube the support structure for that same body to support it. Ants are so strong because they are so small. They use the cube squared law to their advantage. They are quite successful and have reached a niche in the ecology where they have become quite successful. They did this by specializing, which is the insects’ greatest strength. However, specialization limits development and adaptation. True ants can survive in almost any warm climate because they have developed a behavior that is very adaptable; the ants themselves are not so adaptable. Ants simply send out scouts to look for food. When the ants find something they send a message back. If it is a threat soldiers are sent out. If there is no food the ants look elsewhere, and if no message comes back then that area is marked as a poor and dangerous path to take. Have you ever watched an ant search though? They don’t do it in a regular pattern, but in a random one. Since they are looking for smells with their antenna, they have a wide range, but they still operate at random.

The ant’s development is limited by its size and because cells are about as small as they can get. They have had the longest time to evolve so they are the most evolved life form and are the most advanced. Of course it takes unions of cells to create a more advanced creature than a single cell, which is where a lot of life forms have gone. Single cell organisms are still highly efficient and the most numerous form of life.

Ants will never get smarter because of the cube square law and because they have a limited cranium. If they grew in size then pretty quickly the necessary increase in body mass will put them out of the niche they have exploited so well. Ants can get into almost any area; they need that small size not only to give them this, but to give them their strength. Larger ants will need to be stronger just to move themselves, strength that can’t be used to pick up their food. Therefore evolution, in ants, has concentrated on designing the most aggressive and dangerous species, which is why the fire ant is slowly taking over the United States.

Answer 2

I never encountered a question like this before but I am going to say no.

Why? Because cells can't be limitlessly tinier or we would have had a scientist with a nobel prize for finding a cell smaller then an atom. Those are just my thoughts and not guarentees.

Even if cells could be limitlessly tinier, it wouldn't matter because the molecules that provide energy won't grow smaller and the brain of an ant is evolved to fit sufficient energy requirements. Any amount excessively larger then the amount of neurons an ant has already may be too much.

Answer 3

Actually, hypothetically it could be possible, in that one way to measure intelligence of an animal is to caculate the percentage of undifferentiated area, the portion of the brain that isn't being used for anything specific. That is what's used to make connections, and the higher the percentage of undifferentiated tissue, the more intelligent the creature might be.

However, cells can't be limitlessly tinier. There are all these organelles, plus the nucleus with the DNA, that need to fit inside a cell for it to work.

Answer 4

Brain size is not proportional to intelligence. Women generally have a slightly smaller brain then men, and there are plenty of brilliant women in the world.

Answer 5

It could if it were made out of a three dimensional silicon or other much faster semiconductor chip. It is not possible with current technology but it is conceivable that something like that could exist. Nothing biological could be that fast or that small and compare to a human.

Answer 6

as far as i know, intelligence is not measured by the size of the brain...