What Will Happen If We Increase the Number of Neurons in the Human Brain?

It is all about energy consumption.

The energy supply to our brain is rather stable, so it is probably only possible to have tripled number of neurons which consume less energy that the normal one.

The solution is to have neurons and axons with reduced size, so that our brain can hold tripled number of them within a limited space and energy supply.

However, our brain has not adopted this plan as the drawback is too serious for us.

Smaller neurons and axons cause random discharge, since they are too close to each other. It eventually causes noise signals in nerve impulses, reducing the quality of nerve impulses.

The consequence can be seen as having nonsense thoughts resulting from noisy nerve impulses, which we don’t want to see.

There are also three other plans for enhancing our brain that do not work due to serious consequences.

The first plan is to increase the volume of our brain to hold more neurons, which increases total energy consumption. Moreover, a larger brain requires longer axons, which slow down the transmission of nerve impulses.

The second plan is to increase the number of axons to speed up the transmission of nerve impulses between neurons, which increases total energy consumption.

The third plan is to thicken the axons to speed up the transmission of nerve impulses across axons, which increases total energy consumption.

Thus, our brain has evolved to reach an optimal plan for neurons and axons, as the one we are having, but it may continue to evolve.