Animal senses—including sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell—are a masterwork of evolution, enabling an untold number of species to navigate the world. … [Scientists] wonder if our five senses are truly the optimal set of biological tools, or if evolution could provide more or better tools over time.
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Scientists from the U.K. and Russia used a novel method to see if five senses truly represent the pinnacle of human sensory evolution. … First, they focused on a … “engram”—a network of neurons distributed across varying brain regions that activate in unison. Memory maps to these engrams by providing five points of data (one from each of our senses) related to a certain object. If you think of a banana, for instance, your mind can recall all five characteristics derived from our senses.
The resulting model found that if you want to maximize the conceptual space with as many distinct senses as possible, that number nets out to about seven at a steady state. The results of the study were published in the journal Scientific Reports.
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