The Human Brain

Ah, the human brain: the ever-elusive part of the human body, which countless of scientists are trying to understand, but have not been completely successful so far. As a student of science, I acknowledge the possibility that we may not be able to understand the human brain, for how can a machine understand its own workings. As Lyall Watson puts it:

If the brain were so simple we could understand it, we would be so simple we couldn’t.
-Lyall Watson.

And although we may never be able to fully understand its function, we have learned, through research, some very interesting things about it, which have given us a pretty good insight on how it might be functioning.

Following this post will be series of three more, where I discuss three key mechanisms on which the brain functions:

1. Associative Memory: This post will relate to how the brain learns new things by forming or weakening synapses.
2. Mirror Neurons: Also dubbed as “empathy neurons”, these help us connect to other people and explains how we are able to relate to our environment.
3. Conditioning: The most important topic, which explains most of the behavior exhibited by humans.

All these posts will be strictly from a scientific perspective, based on scientific findings. No spiritual voodoo going on here. I’ll take concepts from neurology, behavioral psychology and sociology.

But first, a few basics(for those who didn’t care to read biology in schools). From Wikipedia: The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. The cerebral cortex of the human brain contains roughly 15–33 billion neurons, perhaps more, linked with up to 10,000 synaptic connections each. The brain controls the other organ systems of the body, either by activating muscles or by causing secretion of chemicals such as hormones and neurotransmitters.

In short, it is probably the most complex and the most important organ in the human body. Without it, we would cease to function, to learn, to act, to react, to communicate, and to think.

Now what may be the purpose of this post? Why am I suddenly writing about the human brain? There has to a purpose, right? Yes, there is. The purpose is to educate. I always say that with knowledge comes understanding of the world around you. When we begin to understand how the brain functions, we understand why people behave the way they do. We understand our fellow human being. My sincere hope is that this understanding will help to create much needed understanding in the world. It will help us solve our quarrels. And ultimately, I hope that it plays a small part in building a better world for all, where one respects their fellow human not because of societal rules and norms, but because we have truly begun to understand each other. I would like to live in such a world, won’t you?

Also, in this introductory post, I would like to give a side-note for my more poetic friends. There is no ‘soul’ and your ‘heart’ doesn’t tell you stuff. There is no evidence to support any of these claims. Anything that feels like ‘soul’ or ‘heart’ is essentially emulated by your brain, nothing else. So stop getting brainwashed! Stop believing everything popular media tells you. Their main aim is to make as much money as they can, not to educate you. That’s the main reason they engage in lovey-dovey stuff – because it sells. If they started telling scientific truths, they wouldn’t be able to sell their movies. Believe it – that’s how sick our popular culture is.

Back to my upcoming posts. I hope they will play a small part in making people understand each other, see why discussion and active learning are better than debating and quarreling, and see themselves from a new standpoint. So, stay tuned, stay hungry and stay foolish (a slight modification of Steve Jobs’ statement).

EDIT: Updated the link to the first post. So you can click on it and get reading :)
EDIT 20110917: Updated the link for the 2nd post. Just one more to go :D

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