Structural and Functional Properties

Abstract

My purpose in this chapter is to describe the relevant properties by which the brain can be treated in the same way as every other physical object or system. In humans, the brain is a compact mass weighing around 1500 g, a mass which has progressively increased in the course of phylogenetic development. However, there is a wide, unfilled gap between the brain mass values of humans and those of the higher present-day primates (the brain of the largest ape, the male gorilla, is about one half the size of the human one) hinting that the mass problem is not irrelevant, since the human brain should, thus, contain at least twice as many nerve cells, or “neurons”.