HOW THE BRAIN MAKES POTENTIAL 187mined. Rather, its emergence and maturation critically depend on cross-
modal experiences that alter the under lying neural cir cuit in such a way
that optimizes multisensory integrative capabilities for the environment
in which the animal will function.”^22
Ner vous systems, in other words, greatly extend and amplify develop-
mental plasticity in other bodily systems. In the pro cess, the plasticity has
become indefi nite, open to the abstraction of experienced structure.
But it is a relentless pro cess. Th e structure aff ects be hav ior, which, in turn,
changes the environment in ever- increasing ways. Th is creates still
further challenges for intelligent systems, in spirals of learning and change.
Th e intelligent system of the brain served as a crucial springboard to
the evolution of further complexity. I describe how cognition (or cognitive
intelligence) emerges from such complexity in chapter 7.
WHAT HAS REALLY EVOLVED?Th e account so far provides a coherent evolutionary story. Life itself orig-
inated in the spatiotemporal information structures in “molecular soups.”
Such structures became the means for energy dissipation. Th e pro cesses
evolved as intelligent systems in cells. Th ey assimilate spatiotemporal
structures hitting receptors and tune internal signaling dynamics. Th ese
grammars are then used to predict optimum responses and utilize genes
accordingly.
Such tuning in cells then evolved between cells to regulate intercellu-
lar signaling. Th at all became con spic u ous in the development and phys-
iology of multicellular organisms. Th ese already impart, at this level, high
degrees of adaptability in changeable environments. But in the upward
spiral of changing environments, it was not enough. Behavioral inven-
tiveness, and the brains to furnish and regulate it, became crucial. Th at
required the ability to detect and refl ect informational structure that is
even more abstract. It emerged in a new form of lifelong plasticity in the
modifi able connections among nerve cells. It soon became an evolution-
ary innovation that eclipsed all others.
In that way a new “law” came into play: the more extensive the neural
network, the deeper the informational structure that can be registered
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