Chapter 7: The Thinking Brain

• Introduction
• How did we get big brains?
• Irish Elk analogy 
• Our brain is a scaled up version of a monkey brain
• Question becomes why are we so large?
• Mammal brains scale consistently
• Primate brains scale very predictably
• Extending thinking over time
• Various parts operate in concert
• The pitcher example
• Cortex: select a pitch
• Cortex tells the motor context 
• Motor cortex selects the individual, high level movements
• Motor cortex tells the striatum to perform a lower level movement
• Striatum initiates the individual movements with the body
• This is the basis for higher level planning
• The Cortex Takes Charge
• Larger cortex means more control over the lower portions of the brain and body.