Chapter 290: Mystery of the Nerves

Meng Chao nodded. “I know that insects and annelids have the most primitive nervous systems. Their transfer of neural information is incredibly slow. It might only travel a meter per second, while the neural information transfer in humans can reach one hundred meters per second. It’s one hundred times that of lower life-forms. It’s no wonder then why we can give birth to the sparks of intelligence while our neural information clashes against each other.”

“That’s right. The reason why higher life-forms like humans can transmit neural information so quickly is because our axons have a layer called myelin sheath. The myelin sheath acts as an insulator and prevents nervous impulses from moving from one axon to another. Aside from this, it also uses the principles of saltatory conduction to increase the speed at which action potential is transferred.”

Gao Ye thought about it and gave an example. “Let’s say that the nerves of lower life-forms are bumpy village roads. If you’re careless, your car will end up outside the road. But the nerves of humans and other higher vertebrates have myelin sheaths around them. It’s as if you lifted the road from the surface and sealed it, turning it into an information highway. The speed at which information is transmitted will naturally increase by a hundred times.

“As for superhumans, through absorbing spirit energy and using spirit gas to continuously refine their nervous system, their bodies gradually activate their spirit meridians, and they even gain crystal meridians. It’s the same as upgrading the highways to high speed metal roads. The transmission speed of neural information in high-grade superhumans reaches even a terrifying 1,000m per second. Regardless if it’s their logical deduction skills, calculation abilities, or comprehension, they’re all ten times better than those of a normal person.

“But having a myelin sheath isn’t the only way to get intelligence.

“Many animals choose another path of evolution, and that is to continuously increase the diameter of their nerve fibers.

“Science has proven that the diameter of nerve fibers has a direct correlation to neural information transmission speed.

“The best examples for this are octopi and cuttlefish.

“The diameter of the thickest axon in humans is less than 20 microns. 50 of them are required to form a bundle before they can reach 1mm and be seen with the naked eye.

“And some of the huge axons in squids have a diameter of 1mm, which means that they’re fifty times the size of a human axon.

“They don’t have a myelin sheath, but this thick axon gives squids and octopi high intelligence.

“They are the most cunning creatures in the sea. They even know how to use all sorts of tools. While on Earth, the marine biologists discovered through their research that some octopi will use their soft tentacles to pick up stones by the shore when they hunt their favorite food—oysters. When the oysters open their mouths, they will toss the stones inside and jam the shells. Then, they will eat the oysters’ soft bodies in a relaxed manner.

“This is intelligence that many vertebrates do not possess.

“It’s no wonder then why so many people say that octopi are like aliens on Earth. Without the interference from humans, they might actually evolve to the point that they possess intelligence equivalent to humans.

“When we transmigrated to the Other World, we saw pests with bodies longer than one meter. We were puzzled when we saw large insects, arthropods, and molluscs.

“Because based on research from Earth, the organs and body structure of insects can’t possibly allow them to grow larger than 1m. Even if they are not squashed by their own weight, their fatal weakness of their neural information transmission speed would make their reaction speed incredibly slow.

“But once we captured and dissected some of the insect-type monsters, we noticed that their nerve fibers are the same as those of the octopi and cuttlefish on Earth. The diameter of their nerves had swelled up a hundred times, and that’s why they can move with such agility even though they have huge bodies.”

Meng Chao nodded with a contemplative expression. “So, when you modified Giant Sandworms, you implanted the genetic segments of octopi and cuttlefish into them, so their nerve fibers swelled up to their maximum possible extent, which in turn increased their intelligence?”

“Yes. The Giant Sandworms modified by Spirit Creation Creatures have nerve fibers with diameters that are more than 3mm. It’s enough for them to understand all sorts of complex commands.”

Gao Ye paused for a moment before he said, “If we add myelin sheaths outside the Giant Sandworms’ fibers, their intelligence will increase further, and they will even gain the intelligence of cats and dogs.”

Meng Chao sucked in a deep breath. “What?!”

“There are only two ways of increasing intelligence. You either increase the diameter of the nerve fibers, like octopi had done, or get myelin sheaths around the nerve fibers, like vertebrates do. If you combine both ways by wrapping a myelin sheath around an incredibly thick nerve fiber, the neural information transmission speed will reach terrifying levels. Aren’t you curious as to how terrifying it could be?”

Meng Chao gulped. “Is your company conducting this sort of research?”

“No.” Gao Ye looked regretful. “I do want to modify and create a Giant Sandworm with super-high intelligence, but Xie Xiaolei did not think that it was necessary, because there would be no buyers in the commercial market.

“At the end of the day, he’s a businessman. Whenever he does something, he thinks in terms of profit, so I can only respect his wishes.”

“I think… it’s better if you don’t conduct this sort of research. Otherwise, if you end up creating a Giant Sandworm that is even more intelligent than humans, it’ll be really dangerous.”

“I don’t know what is more dangerous, an intelligent monster or a monster who has no intelligence at all and is only driven by murderous intent,” Gao Ye said. “Have you seen an insect horde before? It’s a wave of snakes, insects, rats, and ants. They form an aggressive black tidal wave and charge continuously at human defenses. No matter how many of their kind are torn to shreds, burnt to a crisp, or electrocuted to the point that sparks fly out of their bodies, the ones at the back will continue charging forward.

“In the end, thousands of vermin will be burnt to ashes, but humans will also be terribly injured. This is what you call both sides losing .

“Why is that so?

“Because an insect horde doesn’t possess intelligence. Insect-type monsters are just machines of flesh and bones, and each of them has a command. They don’t have consciousness, intelligence, or the concept of life and death. When bullets rip through their bodies, they do not feel fear.

“I think that this is the most terrifying thing of all.

“If we can give lower lifeforms some intelligence, we might be able to end the Monster War in another fashion. We don’t have to give them a lot of intelligence, but just make them understand the value of life, the terror of human weapons, and the simple principle that becoming the servants of humans is better than becoming the enemies of humans.”

Meng Chao was not too sure about that.

With just tens of millions of people, even if they could conquer the monsters, they were destined to not be able to occupy the entire planet, because it had a lot of spirit energy, and everyone’s evolution speed was incredibly fast.

This was general knowledge.

When they faced the question of how they should conquer and rule over the Other World, people from different occupations, different factions of power, and those with different interests would give different answers.

In Agricultural University, aka Monster University, the argument that giving monsters a certain degree of intelligence and turning beasts and monsters into spirit beasts and pets so that they could become the vanguards of their kings was very popular. They would become the fighters in Earth’s army, humanity’s servants, tools, companions, and comrades, and like that, the humans would eventually conquer the Other World.

If Meng Chao was in Gao Ye’s shoes, he would probably think like that too.

However, when he remembered the damage caused by the Nine Great Supernatural Entities in his previous life, he felt a little uneasy.

“I still can’t imagine just what sort of impact it would have on our civilization if monsters who are more intelligent than humans appeared,” Meng Chao mumbled.

“Meng Chao, you’re thinking too far ahead,” Gao Ye said. “Neural information transmission speed is just the foundation for the birth of intelligence. It doesn’t mean that when you provide myelin sheaths for sufficiently thick nerve fibers, you will instantly give intelligence to a creature.

“The brain structure of Giant Sandworms is very primitive. It’s completely different from that of humans’ incredibly advanced brain. Even if their neural transmission speed starts moving at a high pace in a complicated and large neural network, without a real brain analyzing and organizing everything, that information will still not produce real intelligence.

“Even if we gave Giant Sandworms larger brains through genetic modification, it’d just be hardware.

“If we look purely at the hardware, the brain size, number of neurons, and brain circuits in prehistoric humans during the stone age billions of years ago was about the same as those of a modern person.

“But the humans during the stone age definitely did not possess the intelligence of modern humans, because intelligence isn’t formed by the clash of nerve impulses. It’s an accumulation of knowledge through billions of years and the summation of all sorts of complicated societal relationships.

“If you throw a normal and healthy modern human infant into the wild and he doesn’t die but lives to eighteen years old, it’ll be impossible for him to have intelligence.

“If you place a strong prehistoric man from the stone age into the current Dragon City, he will not pose any threat.

“So, if you think that when Giant Sandworms possess sufficiently advanced nerves and brains, they will instantly gain intelligence that is so great that they will be able to understand human civilization as well as possess desires and ambitions like humans, that is just alarmist thinking.

“At the end of the day, intelligence is not a necessity when it comes to survival. If Giant Sandworms can live comfortably by eating trash and rocks, there will be no need for them to gain intelligence. They’ll have no interest in it, and they’ll never gain it.”

Meng Chao thought about Gao Ye’s words seriously.

He had to admit that the Giant Sandworm expert’s words made sense.

Then, just what was the Giant Sandworm that evolved into a Supernatural Entity in his previous life?

While he was thinking about it, two researchers wearing negative pressure protective clothing walked out of the lab and handed them the test results.

Gao Ye looked at them, and his expression turned dark. He cussed under his breath.

“What is it?” Meng Chao quickly asked.

“I knew it. Someone injected a virus into the Giant Sandworms!”

Meng Chao thought about it. “Are you sure it was done by humans and they didn’t get infected by some virus around them?”

“That’s hardly possible. There are around a dozen natural subtypes of mutated rabies, and they can all be transmitted between humans and other creatures, but the new mutated rabies subtype discovered in the Giant Sandworms cannot be transferred to the human body. It’s not something produced by natural mutation. It’s something created in a human lab.”

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