Princeton Neuroscience Institute, and Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA.
Behavior of Organisms Laboratory, Instituto de Neurociencias CSIC-UMH, Alicante 03550, Spain.
Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2024 Aug;163:105744. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2024.105744. Epub 2024 May 31.
Every species' brain, body and behavior is shaped by the contingencies of their evolutionary history; these exert pressures that change their developmental trajectories. There is, however, another set of contingencies that shape us and other animals: those that occur during a lifetime. In this perspective piece, we show how these two histories are intertwined by focusing on the individual. We suggest that organisms--their brains and behaviors--are not solely the developmental products of genes and neural circuitry but individual centers of action unfolding in time. To unpack this idea, we first emphasize the importance of variation and the central role of the individual in biology. We then go over "errors in time" that we often make when comparing development across species. Next, we reveal how an individual's development is a process rather than a product by presenting a set of case studies. These show developmental trajectories as emerging in the contexts of the "the actual now" and "the presence of the past". Our consideration reveals that individuals are slippery-they are never static; they are a set of on-going, creative activities. In light of this, it seems that taking individual development seriously is essential if we aspire to make meaningful comparisons of neural circuits and behavior within and across species.
每个物种的大脑、身体和行为都受到其进化历史的偶然性的塑造；这些压力改变了它们的发展轨迹。然而，还有另一组偶然性影响着我们和其他动物：那些在一生中发生的偶然性。在这篇观点文章中，我们通过关注个体来展示这两种历史是如何交织在一起的。我们认为，生物体——它们的大脑和行为——不仅仅是基因和神经回路的发育产物，而是在时间中展开的行动中心。为了解开这个想法，我们首先强调了变异的重要性和个体在生物学中的核心作用。然后，我们回顾了在比较跨物种发育时我们经常犯的“时间错误”。接下来，我们通过一系列案例研究揭示了个体的发展是一个过程而不是一个产物。这些案例研究表明，发展轨迹是在“实际现在”和“过去的存在”的背景下出现的。我们的思考表明，个体是多变的——他们从不静止；他们是一系列正在进行的、创造性的活动。有鉴于此，如果我们希望在物种内和跨物种之间对神经回路和行为进行有意义的比较，那么认真对待个体发展似乎是至关重要的。
