taking the "fiction" out of "science fiction"

First in a series of posts on the future of brain imaging technology (I will use this for a debate in class with the students): CBS's 60 Minutes with Lesley Stahl: "How Technology May Soon 'Read' Your Mind" (picture via Bertrand Thirion).

Watch an interesting lecture on this topic by Martha Farah here ("Imaging the Brain, Reading the Mind" is a Northwestern University public outreach program to help the general public understand the impact of cutting-edge brain imaging technology on human health, law, and ethics).

the blind painter

Eşref Armağan (born 1953) is a blind painter of Turkish origin. He was born blind to a poor family in Turkey, and has been drawing or painting since childhood. He has had exhibitions in Turkey and in Holland and the Czech Republic. In 2004, he was the subject of a study of human perception, conducted by the psychologist John Kennedy of the University of Toronto (watch the video below).

Read more here.

For centuries, scientists believed that the brain was a fixed entity, that it was hard-wired for each individual function, and incapable of reorganizing after injury. The brain, however, is a lot more resourceful than we ever knew it was. Armağan's story has revealed that the brain has the potential to adapt and rewire itself according to individual needs. The brain's ability to reorganize its functions based on new information and experiences is defined as neural plasticity.

networking

A leading neuroscientist warns of negative changes to the 21st century mind as a result of using social networking sites like Facebook. Changes include infantilisation, attention deficiency, selfishness, erosion of identity and an inability to empathise with others.

Interview with neuroscientist Lady Susan Greenfield, Professor of Synaptic Pharmacology at Lincoln College, Oxford and Director of the Royal Institution.

Read more here.

I agree that the environment can change the brain. I agree that social networking sites have no cohesive narrative or long-term significance and that, as a result, a brain might evolve with a shorter attention spam, craving for instant sensation (I especially like this part). But what in fact IS changing childrens brains is the environment as a whole. As for the question of "what is an interaction" and the "craving for instant sensation": I mean, common, there was no Susan Greenfield back then to warn us about the changes in our synaptic activity when the phone was invented!

I also agree that 900 facebook "friends" cannot be called friends. And that facebook represents a true menace in terms of possible addiction. But that just depends on the user. I seriously doubt that one can generalize to the entire facebook population like that.

To sum up: Facebook can be very useful (unless you spend hours feeding your virtual pet or doing quizzes that have no point) and fun. But, as with all things, it should not be used excessiveley.

the brain

Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924.

Part One: Life

CXXVI

The Brain

The Brain—is wider than the Sky—

For—put them side by side—

The one the other will contain

With ease—and You—beside—

The Brain is deeper than the sea—

For—hold them—Blue to Blue—

The one the other will absorb—

As Sponges—Buckets—do—

The Brain is just the weight of God—

For—Heft them—Pound for Pound—

And they will differ—if they do—

As Syllable from Sound—

Summary:

The first stanza contrasts the brain with the sky and shows that the brain is wider, because it can think about the sky and at the same time can think about the person who is thinking about the sky..

The second stanza contrasts the brain with the sea and claims that the brain can absorb the sea as a sponge absorbs a bucket of water, again referring the vast thinking ability of the brain.

The third stanza contrasts, as well as compares, the brain with God. The brain, the speaker insists, is the “weight of God”—for if they are hefted “Pound for Pound,” the brain’s weight will differ from the weight of God only in the way that syllable differs from sound.

Form:

This poem employs all of Dickinson’s familiar formal patterns: it consists of three four-line stanzas metered iambically, with tetrameter used for the first and third lines of each stanza and trimeter used for the second and fourth lines; it follows ABCB rhyme schemes in each stanza; and uses the long dash as a rhythmic device designed to break up the flow of the meter and indicate short pauses.

Interpretation:

Dickinson testifies to the mind’s capacity to absorb, interpret, and subsume perception and experience. The brain is wider than the sky despite its size because the brain is able to incorporate the universe into itself, and thereby even to absorb the ocean. The source of this capacity, in this poem, is God. In an astonishing comparison Dickinson likens the minds capabilities to “the weight of God”, differing from that weight only as syllable differs from sound.

This final stanza reads quite easily, but is actually rather complex— both the brain and God seem to have similar power, since there are no limits to their capabilities. it is difficult to know precisely what Dickinson means. The brain differs from God, or from the weight of God, as syllable differs from sound; the difference between syllable and sound is that syllable is given human structure as part of a word, while sound is raw, unformed.

One interpretation might be that Dickinson seems to conceive of God here as an essence (sound) that takes its form from that of the human mind (syllable), since it is the brain that conceives the idea of God. Another interpretation might be that God still remains greater than the brain, because while the brain is a syllable, God is sound, and the syllable is the instrument by which sound is articulated.

In my own opinion, I don't believe that Dickinson tries to make a statement as to which of the two surpasses the other. Neither do I think that it is a question of which one gives rise to the other: is it the brain that creates God, or is God the creator of the brain? I think that what she actually means by that comparison of syllable and sound is that even if they are alike in terms of capabilities, they are not comparable on the same level, but rather parallel concepts.

source 1, source 2

entity

Wayne McGregor's latest work, Entity, explores the connection between the brain and movement.

Check out McGregor's "Random Dance" website.

Entity is the latest in a series of choreographic inquiries into the relationship between the brain and the moving body - a project which has led McGregor to work with psychologists, neuroscientists and software engineers. The piece is born of his preoccupation with the idea of 'an artificially intelligent choreographic entity' - a piece of software which can 'think' for itself and help generate movement. The relationship between this research and the performance on stage is an abstract one, but the production is studded with visual markers which define the territory.