Any idea where that ability to speak comes from? What made it?

Amen to that!

The conscious mind is common to all minds. It is their function to take information from the surroundings and convert it into motor commands. That means awareness of what is outside and inside. WHat we humans do is have speech. We hear our inner speech we call thought and think we are unique but so do birds hear their inner calls. But What is unique is the ability to make so many diferent sounds that we can assign a sound set to different objects and build a vocabulary to turn into thoughts and then call that consciousness. Its not our brains but our ability to speak that sets us apart.

I like to point out, to anyone who feels some aspect of their physical self makes them different or inferior:
Despite our physical differences, our brain is the only thing that really differentiates us. And brains are all the same color.

TED talks do not usually present coherent explanations of complex science. She is way off base in the causal process of cranial size and body mass. No species has more neurons than they need to do the work of living. Humans stood up learned to pick through the Savannah for food in odd shapes and other wise led more complex lives than fellow primates. You cant cook food until after you catch it and prepare it. SO the cooking is not a clue to brain size. So why did we stand up because we had to move horizontally for food while our primate cousins stayed in the jungle climbing trees for food. We do more complex motions to get food and stay alive than any other species. When we learned to talk after being human for 250,000 years we could try to explain what we could do. We do more work and that is why we have the brains we do. They let us cook so we could do less work per amount of food. The kinds and types of neurons depend on the work which makes food available not the other way around. See Leiberman on the reason humans stood up. Out in the Savannah the food is horizontally distributed. not vertically like in the jungle. .

Farming definitely makes a difference! The way we acquire what we call raw food is hundreds of times more energy efficient than the food one would find walking through the woods or savannah.

So, 16billion neurons in the cortex using 500kCal/day (~25Watts). What does that translate to in terms of RAM, bus speed, and data throughput?

this explains why we have so many cooking shows on TV.
However, we have an enormous growing population of obese people, is that so they can get smarter by consuming more food?

Wouldn't it be great if we could control the energy distribution? I could do some very intense intellectualizing while losing my love handles.

The human brain is more complex than the fanciest computer humans can design, let alone build. How anyone imagines that one can achieve artificial reason--a machine that can think the way you and I think--is beyond my comprehension.

But does anyone here have any idea of the origin of the conscious mind?

Interesting discovery of the number of neurons and the thoughts per gallon (500 calories a day) . If the number of neurons determines cognitive abilities a bird brained macaw is more intelligent so is a dolphin( pilot whale) so back yo the drawing board. The food and cooking theory misses the mark in my opinion. I would focus more on the consciousness of the mind.

"Let’s clarify a few things. Some ask about comparing the total number of neurons between various species. Rather than the total number, it’s the regional distributions of neurons that matters. For example, the author of this talk found that elephants have three times more neurons than humans (2014). But the elephant neocortex, the region for cognitive abilities, had 8 times fewer neurons than in humans. So far so good, but that’s until we examine dolphins and even parrots.

A 2014 study showed that dolphins (pilot whales) have 37.2 billion neurons in the neocortex, twice as many as in humans. Our idea of intelligence is further challenged with parrots, such as the macaw. About a month ago a study showed that macaws have more cortical neurons than many primates, such as the rhesus monkey.

As a neuroscientist, I think the quest for IQ needs to be resolved within our own species first. If we compared Einstein’s brain to the average brain, it’s unlikely that we would discover a much larger number of cortical neurons. It’s more likely that intelligence stems from the way that neurons are connected to each other and which specific areas of the cortex are more developed.

I admire Suzana’s work because not only did she rigorously demonstrate the number of neurons in the human brain, but also proved that the number of glia is not three times more than the number of neurons (it’s ~50:50). Many scientists and even textbooks still use the old information and are teaching it to students.

By way, I agree with posters who point out the lack of evidence that cooking is the reason for our large brains. I don’t know a lot about nutrition, but this hypothesis has already been tested by the large number of people on raw food diets. I’m pretty sure they don’t have to eat more than 9 hours a day to survive. Farming might come into play here… Nevertheless, the cooking hypothesis was not what the author tested and it does not take away from her ingenious work with neurons".
From the comment section Beck Khekoyan.

Interesting find, freedom, Thanks...of course the other thing that happened to us...isssssss....Consciousness!!! [ding ding ding], awareness of our own awareness, self introspection and all of that, is not located in those neurons and doesn't cost anything...unless your one the 60% that can only go with what those neurons crave...which most times, isn't pretty, moral and usually causes us trouble somewhere down the road.

Just watch the news...you'll know to whom we speak.

Laughing...psssst...we're not primates either, but don't tell anyone...
(our makers must curse the day they used that clay)

Glad to add to your ever expanding store of knowledge;^)
I think about this presentation on occasion when I am cooking. Good to start a discussion over a meal with friends.

Fascinating. Thanks!