About

A provisional map of major transitions in information flow and how they could be demarcated in phylogeny. Our project explores how the interplay between major transitions and variation on the types of system enabled by each transition shapes the diversity of intelligences.

Research in theoretical, developmental, and evolutionary biology all seem to be converging upon a remarkable conclusion: that intelligence is everywhere—and with a wider phylogenetic distribution than has commonly been appreciated. Not only that, but recent evidence suggests that intelligence, cognition, and mind may not even require a brain, revising several assumptions about intelligence and its material basis that have predominated the mind and brain sciences for the better part of a century.

Unsurprisingly, the staggering heterogeneity of mindedness and intelligence can lead to difficulties in classification, comparative psychology, and the general study of mind. That is, any two intelligent systems compare and contrast in a dazzling number of ways, something Darwin himself identified with his “endless forms most beautiful”, each being exquisitely adapted to the environment in which it is situated.

This appears to permit two kinds of explanations: cognition can be couched as simple learning, influenced by the environment and constrained by brain size and morphology; or it might be an assemblage of bespoke modules, reshaped and renewed across lineages as demanded. Either explanatory path accounts for complexity, but leaves us in the dark when providing meaningful ways to compare intelligences across distant branches of the tree of life—and beyond with robotics and Artificial Intelligence.

Our project, The Major Transitions in the Evolution of Cognition, generously funded by the Templeton World Charity Foundation and sponsored by the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, charts a third way: that the evolution of cognition is best explained by a handful of major transitions. The delineation and positing of major transitions stems back to Maynard-Smith and Szathmary’s pioneering work on evolutionary transitions in forms of biological complexity and replication. In this project, we extend this research strategy to account for transitions, transformations, and augmentations in the types of information flow and cognitive architectures that support intelligent, adaptive behaviour. Each transition consisted in changes to this information flow, thereby opening up new capacities while transforming the scope of existing cognitive functions.

We will explore these major transitions and their consequences by bringing together cutting-edge work in comparative neurobiology, computational biology, and philosophy. Much is speculative—but, like all good speculation, it is grounded in specific, testable hypotheses.

Ultimately, we aim to frame and situate the relationship of human intelligence to other minds—what we have in common and where we (and other organisms) might be unique. Exploring cognitive evolution in terms of major transitions enables us to identify and provide principles that will open a path to a true science of comparative cognition.