brain capacity plus link to xenolalia glossolalia
zbrain
new scientist
FRANK PERRICONE
Berlin
Vermont
many readers wrote in with similar answers that referred to a
half-remembered television documentary from the 1980s. Had they been
able to use more of their brains, they would have remembered that the
documentary, shown on both BBC and public television (PBS) in the US,
was called Is the Brain Really Necessary? It described the work of the
late British neurologist John Lorber who had studied some very unusual
young patients. All were of normal, or greater than normal, intelligence
and had been sent to him because of minor neurological problems.
Otherwise they did not stand out in any way, either socially or
educationally. Astonishingly, CAT scans revealed that their brains had
been compressed into a thin slab by the slow build-up of fluid inside
the cerebral ventricles, a condition known as hydrocephalus. One
individual in particular had gained a first-class degree in mathematics
although the average thickness of his grey matter was claimed to be only
1 millimetre, rather than the usual 45 millimetres.
These findings may well have reinforced the myth that we only use 10 per
cent of our brains. But what they really show is that the developing
brain is very adaptable and that when a neurological problem develops
slowly in a young person, one part of the brain may compensate for
losses elsewhere.
Recent neurobiological research reinforces the view that particular
functions are not rigidly restricted to particular areas. If you learn
to play the violin, for example, the area of brain tissue devoted to
controlling the hand will expand. And even adults suffering from damage
to the brain as a result of a stroke may partially recover as new parts
of the brain take over. That the brain can compensate for injury does
not, however, imply that large parts of the brain are normally "spare"
or unused.
On the other hand, even though we may all be using all of our neural
tissue, that doesn't mean that we aren't all capable of doing more
things. It's always astounding that among groups of physicists at an
international centre such as CERN, for example, some are capable of
speaking only one language (the Americans) while others may have found
room in their brains for four languages (the Swiss), but all are equally
good at physics--unless CERN has evidence to the contrary.
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