A survival strategy

It all comes down to sex. Our bodies latched on to any genetic

adaptation that helped us survive long enough to pass our genes on

to the next generation. There’s no bigger rule in biology than evolution

through

natural selection, and the

brain is a biological

tissue. So

it too follows the

rule of

natural

selection.

There

are

two

ways to beat the

cruelty of a harsh

environment:

You can become

stronger or

you can become

smarter.

We did the

latter.

It seems most

improbable that such a

physically

weak species

could

take over the planet not by adding muscles to our

skeletons

but by adding

neurons to our

brains. But

we did, and scientists

have

expended

a great deal of effort trying to figure out how. I want to

explore four major concepts that not only set the stage for all of the

Brain Rules, but also explain how we came to conquer the world.