General intelligence is largely based on two distinguishable mental abilities: crystallized intelligence (gC) and fluid reasoning ability (gF). The target article authors' P-FIT model emphasizes a network of regions throughout the brain as the neural basis for fluid reasoning and/or working memory. However, it provides little significant insight into the neural basis of gC, or how or why gC is more stable than gF across the life span.

Blair proposes that fluid intelligence, working memory, and executive function form a unitary construct: fluid cognition. Recently, our group has utilized a combined correlational–experimental cognitive neuroscience approach, which we argue is beneficial for investigating relationships among these individual differences in terms of neural mechanisms underlying them. Our data do not completely support Blair's strong position.

The primrose path and prisoner's dilemma paradigms may require cognitive (executive) control: The active maintenance of context representations in lateral prefrontal cortex to provide top-down support for specific behaviors in the face of short delays or stronger response tendencies. This perspective suggests further tests of whether altruism is a type of self-control, including brain imaging, induced affect, and dual-task studies.

During the red supergiant (RSG) stage of massive star evolution, emission from dust and molecules allows the copious stellar winds to be studied in great detail. This help us understand not only the evolutionary stages of the star (which are highly dependent on mass loss rates), but also the morphology of the eventual supernova remnant. Maser emission from OH and H2O has been mapped with milli-arcsec resolution (using MERLIN and the EVN/global VLBI) around RSG including VY CMa, S Per and VX Sgr. The H2O masers originate in clouds accelerating away from the star and OH mainlines masers interleave the outer parts of the H2O maser shell. Zeeman splitting of OH maser lines reveals the orientation and strength of stellar-centred magnetic fields.