Behind the Scenes of The Brain Show

by Zeev Nitsan

  Committed to Saving Energy

  Adjacent brain areas tend to be parts of the same functional system. The mutual activity relies on the geographic proximity, so the information passes through shorter channels, which decreases the amount of energy required for information processing.

  Due to the proximity, there is less depreciation in the quality of information, and the information is transferred, in a shorter period of time, to its target by means of bioelectrical action potentials. The depreciation in information quality and the time needed for the information to reach its target are usually in direct correlation with the length of the connection path and in inverse correlation with the thickness of the axon that passes the information, and are also affected by other causes, such as the level of the axon’s “insulation” by the myelin coating.

  Thus, one may say that the proximity between brain areas that process similar types of information derives from the devotion of our brain to the energy-saving principle.

  The Brain—a Dance Floor, Boxing Arena, and Theater Stage

  The brain is an ecosystem of functional systems. Sometimes they dance cheek to cheek, and sometimes they fight one another as rivals in a boxing arena in an attempt to dictate the brain’s agenda. The brain may be compared to a confederation of autonomous districts that every so often challenge the central regime.

  If we compare our brain to a theater, we may also say that the stage of our brain is filled with main actors and co-stars who constantly exchange roles. Their casting is ever changing (our brain is the stage, and all the neurons are the actors), and the actors move from the stage of awareness to the backstage of the brain and back. Alongside the central stage, there are also fringe theater stages at the dim corners of the brain.

  Our Brain as a Montage Artist—Creating Fascinating Combinations

  The conceptualization of reality, which derives from combining the outputs of different brain areas, shares similarities with the art of montage (from the French, “montage,” assembling handicraft). In a similar way to a film editor who integrates individual photos into one filmic continuum, our brain integrates individual experience impressions into a sense of a whole experience.

  There is a philosophical approach according to which conceptualization, in terms of time and space, is merely the creation of our brain and does not exist objectively.

  The reality-compatible pattern, which is loyal to the directionality of the arrow of time, is imprinted on our perception records (it is done in the frontal lobes at the same time information is retrieved from our memory). Prior to this process, perception records in the brain act as anarchists. They do not obey the rules of time and place and appear in a nonchronological, nonsequential continuum, in a sort of seamless unity. At the same time, a “timeless” component also exists within the space of our skull. Events from different periods of time “take place” in our brain simultaneously.

  Some might claim that the imprinting of pattern-of-time directionality and causality is a Houdini-like illusion produced by the brain.

  The Domino Effect in the Brain of the One Who Looks at You From the Mirror

  The brain of the one who looks at you through the mirror is composed of about a hundred billion neurons that communicate by means of about a hundred trillion inner connections. The interactions between the functional systems of the brain often make the activity in a certain area of the functional system create a sort of a domino effect that echoes throughout the system. The interaction between the different parts of the brain sometime presents nonlinear correlations. Occasionally, recruitment of a small number of additional neuron columns reinforces the level of overall processing in the brain significantly.

  The Brain as a Pattern-Processing Apparatus

  Our brain tends to recognize patterns of order within the input that reaches it, which is sometime chaotic. These patterns of order are actually patterns that offer the perception mechanism of the brain some tools that will enable it to organize and process the input. The pattern-recognizing approach, adapted by our brain, makes the brain recognize similarities between a current situation and a past situation. Using these similarities, our brain is able to choose an action plan that is based on proven past action plans. If the action plan fails, the brain relies on the insights and lessons learned as a result of the failure. The coping approach, which is based on pattern recognition, in spite of overgeneralization or oversimplification related to it sometimes, is essential so that we do not meet a new, unfamiliar world every morning. This approach sometimes requires “selective blindness” with regard to certain aspects of the new situation.

  The Familiar and the New

  According to a popular view adapted by many brain researchers, in cases when the perception impression mediated by the sensory organs finds a link to an existing perception pattern, an echoing loop that is based on a “stimulus that contains familiar components” is created. When the perception impression does not find a link to one of the patterns that are already encoded in our brain, it requires the allocation of more mental resources in order to create a totally new echoing loop—of a stimulus with unfamiliar characteristics. The human brain is a creature of habit. Built into it is a preference for old, familiar information over new, seasonal information.

  Pattern Recognition Formed as a Cocktail of Genetics and Environment

  Not all recognizable patterns are the product of former, repetitive life experiences acquired throughout the years. Some of these patterns are built in to our perceptional mechanism from the moment we are born. Different animals have different mixes of innate patterns and acquired ones. Even recognizable patterns at early stages of life require critical exposure to an appropriate environmental stimulus in order to carry out the potential of recognition. In other words, the pattern recognition ability, as with most of our mental skills, is a mix of genetic potential and appropriate environmental stimulus.

  Generalizing patterns are like drainage basins. Most global patterns are created out of extracting various aspects of the world of phenomenon into one coherent insight, which is the drainage basin that serves numerous streams of perception impressions.

  Structural Code Programming and Open Code Programming

  All brain areas speak the same language—the language of the bioelectrical evoked potentials, which speaks itself in sentences of the intensity of the evoked potentials and their distribution over time and space. While using the same language for transferring information, however, the various brain areas are different with regard to their ability to organize and encode the information. Certain brain areas that use an “open code” method create an independent programming language that gradually improves itself. It seems that the most recently acquired brain areas, which appeared in a later period in the evolution of the human brain, have a better ability of self-programming. This type of programming is performed by means of creating complex information clusters designed to encode patterns of deeper layers of the phenomenon world. More senior brain areas have a more limited cognitive maneuvering ability, and they mostly rely on built-in wiring, which is similar to built-in code programming. Thus, for instance, the associative, multisensorial cortex, which merges the various impressions of the senses into a coherent reality perception, includes a relatively small number of prewired solutions in advance and is flexible enough to deal with the input. On the other hand, the subcortical, more senior brain areas in the arena of the brain development are mostly based on information processing patterns that have been there from an early stage, and their ability to change their coping approach is somewhat limited. It seems one of the factors that brought about considerable improvement in the abilities of the human brain is the development of areas that operate according to an open code programming approach as opposed to an older approach that is similar to built-in code programming.

  Upper and Lower Routes

  The Upper and Lower Routes—Warning note: Conceptualization of the different activity pattern of the neural paths in terms o
f upper and lower routes may sin in oversimplification.

  A common definition of the lower route is neural networking that creates behavioral motivation, which sometimes relies on “volcanic eruptions” of raw urges. The lower route is composed of a changing mix of unconscious thinking processes, mainly emotion derived and relatively rapid. These rapid activity patterns are similar to heuristics (behavioral rules based on previous experiences). From this point of view, a human being is, in many senses, a creature of instincts.

  On the other hand, behavioral motivation, which is based on the neural paths of the upper routes, is created by voluntary thinking processes, which are based on a conscious intention to make sense and are slower in nature.

  The upper route operates at the conscious level. It often requires strenuous intentions and is slower than the lower route. This is probably what lies behind the advice to count to ten before reacting, which, practically, means to stall for time until the upper route starts working in an attempt to control the messages of the lower route.

  There is still controversy over the structures included in each of the systems. The lower route includes central structures in the functional system in the brain called the limbic system, which includes the brain structure called the amygdala. The upper route includes areas in the prefrontal cortex, an area called the anterior cingulate gyrus, etc.

  It seems that in the moment of truth, while we are “under fire” in life’s battle, our brain (“brain” in the sense of a slow, rationalistic action pattern that mostly relies on the prefrontal cortex) tends to take shelter behind the heart (“heart” in the sense of an emotion-driven action pattern that activates a heuristic action pattern, which is executed rapidly and mostly relies on the limbic system). The researcher Joseph Ledoux, explained the survival advantage of this kind of ‘taking shelter’ by saying that when we allowing evolution to do the thinking for us at first, through the quicker route of the emotional brain, we gain the necessary time to think about the situation and act wisely.

  Longitudinal and Latitudinal Roads

  In each of the hemispheres, there are “longitudinal roads”—neural paths paved along the longitudinal axis of the hemisphere—and “latitudinal roads,” which are paved along the latitudinal axis of the hemisphere and serve as connecting channels between the two hemispheres. Most of the paths that connect the amygdala, which motivates instinctive, emotion-driven behavior, to the frontal lobes, which motivate calculated and restrained behavior, are longitudinal paths.

  The anterior cingulate gyrus and the frontal cortex are key areas with regard to emotion regulation and moderation of the stormy waves of the amygdala. The amygdala has particularly “touchy” buttons, and it is, in fact, the center of the emotion wheel, whose spokes reach various brain areas.

  When there is not enough mental energy to create “behavior filters” by the virtual filter of the frontal lobes, “raw” behavioral patterns appear. These patterns teach us about more basic layers of our consciousness and the processes creating our behavior. In such situations, the upper route does not manage to enforce its rule.

  It seems that almost all our actions are based on a mix of brain processing derived from both systems. Most of our actions derive from mutual activity of both systems, and, in any case, it seems that when one system rules exclusively, it is the lower path system. In other words, it seems that certain actions rely exclusively on the lower path, while there is doubt if any of them rely exclusively on the upper one.

  In most cases, our actions are based on a mix of unconscious thinking processes that are relatively rapid and mostly emotion driven. Along with these types of thinking processes, there are also voluntary, slower thinking processes that derive from a conscious intention to let logic rule.

  Clear limitations are built-in to the attempt to investigate the action pattern of the lower route, which is unconscious, by exploring the conscious upper route (for example, by giving questionnaires to subjects).

  Dwarfs and Knights

  During routine brain activity, the paths of the lower route are bustling. In their dark paths pace the agile dwarfs of the unconscious kingdom, who perform most tasks in the brain. They are the proletariat that enables brain civilization. The knights of the upper routes are not driven to action that often. They need time to adjust their armor and prepare their horses, so their action is slower.

  The complex tasks performed by our brain cast the dwarfs’ proletariat of the lower route and the knights of the upper route in different mixes. At certain times, in a pattern of topological juggling, we manage to combine the upper and the lower routes into a single route of action. For example, the field of behavioral economics, which explores patterns of behavior in various economics-related situations, demonstrates the great impact of the lower route, that is mostly derived from emotions, even in territories where processing is allegedly rationalistic and emotion-free.

  The Esperanto of Neurons—the Universal Language of the Brain

  The standard communication interface between neurons is the language of bioelectrical evoked potentials, which was defined as the keystone of understanding the information-handling processes in the brain. The uniformity with regard to the language spoken by the different brain areas follows a repetitive pattern in nature, known as the “saving artist”—saving while performing various tasks by means of using known common routes—as opposed to the approach of “finding a thousand different ways to solve a thousand different problems.”

  The “globalization” strategy, in which global processes are combined with local processes, is at the heart of the communication interface of the brain. The local language in different brain areas exists as a global pattern of the whole brain.

  The various areas of the cortex use unified data processing approaches—a kind of algorithms of information processing—that are valid in different brain areas.

  Various types of sensory input—eyesight, hearing, and smell—although they are mediated to the sensory organs in various manners: a barrage of photons, molecular vibration, and volatile molecules, respectively, mediate to the brain and act within it through the same language. The differences in the experience manifestation, formed by the various inputs of the different senses, derive from the different connection patterns of the various brain areas responsible for the absorption and processing of the sensorial input with other brain areas—not from the variation in the communication interface, which is unified throughout the brain kingdom (the language of bioelectrical potentials).

  In other words, from the variance in the wiring pattern between various brain areas is the source of the ability of designated brain areas in which a certain input from a specific sense produces an experience manifestation, which has different qualities from the qualities of other manifestations that derive from inputs from other senses that mediate in the same language.

  Information processing in the brain takes place, at least partially, through a fractal pattern (a similar pattern related to ascent or descent in the level of resolution). This language of bioelectrical potentials exists from the sole neuron level through the neurons columns—the whole hemisphere—to the whole brain.

  The ability to activate a unified language algorithm throughout the brain kingdom derives from the fact that the letters of this language are universal throughout the brain, and those letters are bioelectrical action spurts. These are currents of electrical charge that are mostly mediated in an electrochemical manner and move among the neurons. The brain does not know a different language. When we look at a certain object, information from the various senses is transferred to the brain as patterns of unique action spurts that turn into a unique letter according to the manner in which they are distributed through time and space. The distribution pattern in space derives from the number of axons involved in the process of routing and placing the action spurts, or, in other words, from the three-dimensional neural networking pattern that participates in transferring the specific input.

  The
time-distribution pattern derives from the duration of the action spurts and the timing relations between them. All the inputs we perceive from both the external and internal (our own body) environments are eventually translated into the same language of action-spurt patterns over the time and space axes. This is the only language our brain speaks.

  The words of the entire perception—the sensory input from within our body and from outside our body—are spoken only in this language. Without this unified communication pattern, our brain would resemble the Tower of Babel, with numerous communication protocols. Although the brain is unilingual in terms of the communication pattern, its products enable it to become multilingual. It “understands” the language of speech; the language of music; body language; and the language of math, and the unified communication pattern is the universal language that is responsible for its ability to speak various languages. The versatile function ability of the brain, which acts like a jack-of-all-trades, derives from all neurons speaking the same language.

  The brain processes information and translates it into a single language—the pattern of action spurts across the time and space axes. numerous brain areas are capable of conducting a variety of tasks and even to change their “expertise,” from specializing in a specific processing task to specializing in a different type of task. It does this mostly through changing the connection pattern to various brain areas, a phenomenon that is reflected in the term “brain plasticity.” Familiarity with the language of the brain enables different brain areas to perform the processing, for both internal and external sources of input, which is mediated by different sensory organs. The brain, which always tends to be efficient and save space, takes advantage of all available spaces, as would a skilled real-estate agent. For example, it is known that adult blind people use areas in the occipital lobes in order to read braille letters. People who are not blind use these areas for processing visual input. Since the braille alphabet is mediated through touch, one would expect that brain areas that are related to such an input would become activated, but the unemployment forced upon the occipital lobes of the blind turns, with time, into full-time employment decoding the braille alphabet; thus, there is no such a thing as unemployment in the brain kingdom.