Compared to a human brain with its 86 billion nerve cells, a bee’s brain may have only about a million. But each one of these cells has a finely branched structure that in complexity may resemble a full-grown oak tree. Each nerve cell can make connections with 10,000 other ones—hence there may be more than a billion such connection points in a bee brain—and each of these connections is at least potentially plastic, alterable by individual experience.
I remember from Robert Sapolsky's lectures that human neurons also take input from 10,000 (on average) other neurons. So bees are the same. But it feels like this paragraph is trying to convince me that the branching structure of bees is somehow more elaborate than the human equivalent.
Still reading, but I feel I can no longer trust the narrator.
I remember from Robert Sapolsky's lectures that human neurons also take input from 10,000 (on average) other neurons. So bees are the same. But it feels like this paragraph is trying to convince me that the branching structure of bees is somehow more elaborate than the human equivalent.
Still reading, but I feel I can no longer trust the narrator.