h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Back to your original point - that only using 10% is liking evolving an unemployed third arm.....

Maybe the other 90% is purely cosmetic, but comes in handy for skiboxing.

This may be of interest...

http://eslvcr.fireplug.net/bcskeptics/ratenq/Re3.2-Brain10.html

Tim

While it may be possible to live a "normal" life with large chunks of brain missing, I think it may possibly be to do with the fact that the brain is a _living_ entity.

What I mean by this is that connections between neurons are being made and re-made constantly - it is not something that stops at adulthood.

I think being able top operate with a large proportion missing only means that the brain is able to adapt, to "remake" the missing portions using existing neurons - very "bionic man". What would be interesting is to see whether the certain functions of the "new" brain are slower, because connections are made with fewer neurones in each cluster.


AndyF
PS - I don't categorically know that this is true - I could just be talking out of my arse.

Your right to an extent in that the brain does essentailly rewire itself and "relearn" the pathways to make up for lost functionality. It is also true that it can rarely get the individual back up to "full speed". This is not suprising wsince the growth the brain is capable in adulthood is not at anywhere near the same level in childhood. It is partially true that you can't teach an old dog new tricks (unless they're very easy ones, or involve loss of bowel control)

In reply to Merkin, the "Third Eye" is supposedly the Pineal Gland. The anterior lobe of the Pituitary Gland has a lot to do with hormones that control body growth, e.g. excessive growth hormone secretion can lead to 'pituitary giants' over 8-feet tall. Due to the arrangement of nerve fibres in the human brain, the bigger the pituitary swells it can 'choke' nerve input to the optic nerve and reduce the amount of peripheral vision that the 'giant' can see. So indirectly, eyes and the pituitary are linked.
The pineal gland secretes melatonin which supposedly relieves insomnia and produces a sense of well-being. Darkness apparently stimulates melatonin release and light inhibits it, although the level of melatonin release cycles daily even without visual cues.
The strange idea that drinking some of your own urine is good for you, is linked because urine contains melatonin. I accidently drank my girlfriend's urine once (mistook it for a glass of wine sitting by the bed the morning after a drunken night of depravity) but I can't say it had a calming effect on me when I realised what it was. I've always thought twice about taking the p*ss out of a woman since then

That 10% (or so) figure was developed by a man named Samuel Renshaw, a researcher at Ohio State University in the.. oh, 1930s or '40s or thereabouts. Everyone jumped on his figure and ran with it, if you'll excuse a mix of metaphor here.
The really odd thing is that Renshaw went on to develop techniques to teach people how to use more of their brains. Someone mentioned a science fiction story based on that, I think s/he was referring to Robert A. Heinlein's "Assignment in Eternity" where some people learned all this stuff and were psychic, clairvoyant, telekinetiscists, etc. Renshaw didn't claim all of that, though.
Anyway, my point was that it is very difficult (so far impossible) to find anything about Renshaw's work. I've read that he helped people become better learners, develop eidetic/photographic memory, learn to speed-read, etc. But nowhere can I find anything abou the techniques used.
I feel a conspiracy theory coming on, so I'm going to stop writing now.

I've heard that story about the bloke with the spike in his head... it just goes to show. What it goes to show, I don't know. But there it is.

Thank you so much, it was "Assignment in Eternity", that had been annoying me vaguely for some time...

And a darned good book it is too, I can heartily recommend pretty much anything by the great Heinlein, especially "Have a Space Suit, Will Travel".

I'd always considered the 10% thing as being that the average person only uses 10% of their intellectual potential - with no reference to the paranormal/X files elements.


;^)#
unknowingly bending the urban myths to his own belief

Ok I'm going to throw in what I've heard. Mainly beacuse I havem't seen it mentioned. Our brains use electricity to make all those thoughts right?Well electricity flowing requires isulation or else it "short circuits." Well it turns out that the "insulation" stuff of our brain's is about 90% of the whole mass, and the "wires" are 10%. It's pretty easy to see that someone hearing that they can use 10% of there brain assumed that it was 10% of one's mind. But I do believe that we use 100% of our "wires," essentially.

good save on the arse.





where am I?

I have to agree with Merkin- while we may use all parts of our brains, we definately don't use all of them to their full capacity. I don't think we have enough time in our lives to exercise all those parts enough to get them to their full capacity.

You can, of course, increase the usage of your various brain functions by exercising them. Yes. The more you use your brain, the more synapses you grow, which makes the knowledge you're accessing easier to access. If you wanna be a genius, EXERCISE that muscle between your ears.

Though why anybody would want to is beyond me. I mean, people take drugs to dim down their IQ's.

I agree with you completely.


BUT...
Just to play Devil's Advocate - what proof do you personally have that you actually think with your brain at all. For all you know, you might currently be mulling this over deep within the confines of your left foot. My point is that scientists can prove that the brain is active, but not what those activities achieve. To understand that, we must first understand the very nature of thought itself. Now if you'll excuse me, all of this thinking is giving my foot a migraine.

Hmmm.... "left foot", eh? Well, actually the proof we think with our brane-pans has been demonstrated by electrically stimulating the said organ, with corresponding sights/sounds/smells/feelings/etc. being reported by those who's brane-pans have been thus stimulated.

Of course, I think with my penis.

As do most men. But it again becomes a percentage question...

Now that we're below the belt. . .Did you know that when most people sit down, they only use 10% of their bottom? What a terrible waste.

I'm sure Einstein used more. Too bad they didn't save any of it for later study. But I do hear that many Scientologists have become so advanced that they are using their entire bottom a great deal of the time, even when they aren't sitting.

Yeah. I hear that they make more efficient use of it by talking out of it a great deal.

Talking and thinking with the same part of the body does seem a lot more effecient. Perhaps they have something there... where's my checkbook?

Actually, it saves on sofa space. Think how crowded Doctors waiting rooms would seem if everybody used 100% of their arse! It could cause a major shortage of sofa!

Whereas, if you get a big head, it's up to you to carry it around all day and you don't trouble anybody else.