Behind the Scenes of The Brain Show

by Zeev Nitsan

  As for the preeminence of man, some claim that the uniqueness of mankind is the meta-knowledge: the knowledge about knowledge, about the partiality of the knowledge, and even its lack.

  The apples of the Tree of Knowledge, which we picked while climbing the evolution tree—insights that were etched in our brain while we climbed to the treetop of intelligent creatures on planet Earth—are like the collective memory of the entire evolutionary journey etched in our DNA strands.

  Some may disagree with the phrase “climbing the evolution tree,” which may ascribe teleological reference to evolution, and say that the process of evolution is better described as a random wandering through the paths of life. In other words, they might say that a more suitable graphic description of evolution is a tree with several branches; our species is at the end of one of these branches, rather than on top of a ladder. However our evolutionary journey is described, its lessons are etched in our brain and have a great impact on our behavior.

  Language as a Central Conceptual Tool

  Language is a manner of defining world patterns. It is a tool for classification and diagnosis—a taxonomy that categorizes the multiple impressions that flood our perception. The world of phenomena constantly throws at our consciousness perception impressions, which change as in a psychedelic kaleidoscope.

  Language equips our brain with an aphorismic tool, which enables us to summarize the overall impression of an experience without having to retain all of its shades in our memory. This is the source of the spell it casts on our brain, which is in charge of aphorism as a central tool of memory and thinking.

  In language, there are no “built-in truth filters,” and yet it is a means of patterning our world, because the rules of language match the ecological niche and the accumulated life experience of humankind. The language fences and isolates sayings that contradict human logic, such as the saying “I tripped and fell up.”

  Language rules create pattern and order in the world of phenomena around us. In this sense, language assists in patterning our world and also serves as “cognition designer.” Language allows conceptual flexibility, which does not “break the rules.”

  Language is not only the spokesperson of logic. Sometimes it is the spokesperson of emotions and often presents various mixes of the two. Language contains fingers that skillfully press the buttons of emotions in our brain.

  Describing a subjective experience and matching it to the linguistic categories might be a type of Taming of the Shrew.

  At a young age, thought is formed alongside the momentarily sensory input, and it is extremely tangible and “earthy.” When language skills are acquired, the ability to conceptualize abstract concepts or fictional occurrences that are not related to the material, momentary experience is acquired, too. Language gives us wings, and yet some see it as restricting the ceiling of thoughts. In this context, philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein once said, “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.”

  Our verbal competence might be affected by hormonal changes in our body. For example, a study showed that women are better at performing verbal tasks on the second week of their menstrual cycle. It might be ascribed to the effect of estrogen, which induces the creation of synapses in the hippocampus and is at its peak then. (Thus, women are recommended to conduct an unavoidable argument with their spouses especially on the twelfth day of the menstrual cycle, on which their verbal competence is at its peak.)

  And, again, we will repeat as Cato the Elder: words and thoughts have a chemical manifestation in our brain. In other words, words and thoughts are reflected at the level of material molecules, and they magically cause changes in the mixes of neurotransmitters and the patterns of bioelectrical potentials among brain cells, which are translated into emotional and conceptual motivation.

  Although thoughts are spiritual creations, they cause material changes. It is also true for the words of our language—in many senses, words equal actions.

  Monological Dialogue—The Inner Speech

  Some see thinking as a type of “inner discourse.” Language and thinking are strongly connected. Some see thinking as the source from which the spring of words flows, or a cloud from which a shower of words derives and which is formed in a pattern of “inner speech.”

  Very often the language skills grade the capacities of this inner discourse. On the other hand, there are thinking layers that are not verbal; thus, some might claim that the saying “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world” is too comprehensive.

  Fuzzy Logic—The “Roughly” Thinking

  Fuzzy logic is an approach that ascribes to truth a relative value that ranges from zero (total lie) to one (total truth). Most cases are in between zero to one and can be defined as “partial truth” (or, alternately, “partial lie”) in accordance with the level of proximity to one of the ends of the continuum between one and zero.

  The fuzzy logic approach is different from the Boolean logic approach, which is based on a dichotomous-binary approach and ascribes absolute values to truth and lie values of one—lie—and one—truth—without any intermediate values in between them. This is, in fact, the ordinary theory of logic in which a claim can only be true or false. In fuzzy logic, graded, qualitative rulings are used, such as “more,” “less,” “large,” “small,” and “good” instead of absolute verdicts, such as “lie” and “truth.”

  Some may define fuzzy logic as an accurate method of thinking in terms that are not accurate.

  Fuzzy logic enables us to deal with the difficulty of quantifying qualitative data whose values are relative rather than absolute. The importance of “roughly” is that using terms such as “in most cases” and “usually” enables us to grant a relative value to truth. Although the conclusions of fuzzy logic are not as absolute as those of accurate logic, they often provide a satisfactory solution while covering a wider range of situations.

  The famous saying in the world of medicine, “In medicine, as in love, there is no always and no never,” is based on the medium between the two absolute ends.

  In an attempt to quantify a qualitative measure, I may privately think that the beauty of the neighbor who lives at the end of the street is 0.84 (a thought I will not share with my wife, of course…).

  Language is a classification tool in the service of soft, fuzzy logic. It seems that the need for the scale of relativity of the fuzzy logic was an important trigger for the development of language, which, in turn, broadened the scope of distinctions of the soft, fuzzy logic.

  Soft, Fuzzy Logic—The Brain’s Favorite Logic Language

  Our brain zigzags between using soft, fuzzy logic and using Boolean logic in accordance with the circumstances (the soft, fuzzy logic relies on the definitions that do not convert the qualitative characteristics into a numeral value, as in standard fuzzy logic, but, rather, grant a relative value to them, thus the term soft, fuzzy logic), but it seems that it uses soft, fuzzy logic much more. Thus, for example, the rules of thumb (heuristics) that guide numerous aspects of our behavior derive from using soft, fuzzy logic. Our brain uses soft, fuzzy logic as a result of constraints, such as lack of information or lack of time, which exist in many situations in life.

  Common sense, which serves us in our daily life, in which numerous situations are ambiguous, is primarily based on soft, fuzzy logic.

  The component of relativity is inherent in fuzzy logic, and it serves us well, since most of the situations in our life are painted in shades of gray rather than the black and white of totality. The relative terms allow the differentiation that characterizes the resolution of our daily life (thus, for example, our neighbor is tall compared to most people we meet on the street, but not compared to the Maasai people, who wander in Eastern Africa and whom most of us do not meet in our routine life).

  Fuzzy Logic in the Service of Artificial Intelligence

  An ordinary computer program that tries to reach a decision based on certain source data and ordinary logic rules
is capable only of absolute rulings and cannot cope with “almost” or “roughly” situations.

  In order to spill “common sense” into the “silicon intelligence,” computerized expert systems, in which human knowledge is assimilated, need to use fuzzy logic in order to cope with reality manifestations that are not perceived as unequivocal.

  Using fuzzy logic enables the expert systems to use prediction tools that are true in most situations (heuristics). This provides an answer to a variety of situations in which information is not complete and absolute.

  Fuzzy logic enables computerized systems to reach conclusions in uncertain conditions through an inference engine, which relies on values that are relative to truth.

  Intuition

  Some believe that our “gut feelings” merge, in various degrees, voices from the emotional brain with the voices of subconscious insights. We tend to accept or reject their recommendations according to the circumstances and to our basic approach toward “nonrationalistic” arguments.

  Our gut feelings, which are not based on evidence, at least not in a conscious manner, are partially channeled toward the brain areas called the insula and the anterior cingulate gyrus. It seems that the insula is a brain area that has a central role in the processing of such feelings. The cingulate gyrus, which, on average, seems bigger and more active in the female brain, tends to add to our mental climate a cloudlet of skepticism and might cause us to perceive reality through a lens in a dark, impartial pair of figurative glasses.

  Logical inference and intuition are two main thinking approaches in our brains.

  The systematic inference, which is based on rules of logic, is formed in the cortex. Intuitive identification greatly involves the amygdala.

  Often, gut feelings are not some abstract emotional conditions that echo within us but, rather, intensive feelings that direct our behavior. Goose bumps usually serve as a behavioral compass. Some might claim that whenever we let the instant judgment of the intuition have a great impact on our decision making, we live according to the manifestations of our goose bumps.

  Our natural tendency to find order and common sense around us, and to identify causal relations between events, sometimes leads us to the wrong conclusions. A common trap is the perception of noncausal correlation as a causal one, or an erroneous link between events that are not related in a causal manner (such as the link between a rain dance and the amount of rainfall).

  Children tend to perceive noncausal correlations between world manifestations as causal due to the lack of sufficient database and immature brain structures in charge of forcing the causal, logical connection (primarily, prefrontal lobes). This is how charming “childhood insights” appear, such as the request of my young son not to take off his glasses while he is asleep so that he can watch his dreams clearly. There is also the example of the boy who left his parents’ house at a late hour of the night and started coughing. When he was asked how he felt, he said, “Everything is fine; I just swallowed some darkness.” There is also the girl whose aunts used to pinch her cheek while calling her “Honey.” When she asked her mother to kiss her, she told her to kiss her on the “honey,” which meant her cheek.

  Intuition is a survival tool that allows rapid interpretation, which bypasses rationalistic, tiresome analysis. Sometimes the price we are required to pay for these shortcuts is erroneous conclusions.

  Yet, sometimes it is logical to be “illogical.” When we are about to make a decision based on very partial, or doubtful, knowledge, not infrequently it would be wise to make a decision based on our gut feelings, which supposedly lack the logic component.

  A common perception of intuition is as a “wondrous” thinking leap, which sometimes seems puzzling, does not plod along the tiring path of information processing in a logical, systematic manner, and does not require thorough processing and analysis. Some see it as a process that completely lacks conscious analysis, or as one that takes place at the preanalysis stage. Some brain researchers, however, believe that intuition is, in fact, a concentrate of complex analysis processes that are compressed into a sort of refined capsule of analysis—a product that may be defined as an “extract of patterns.” According to this view, intuition is, in fact, a stage beyond the ordinary information analysis (a post-analysis stage).

  In this context, Einstein had a surprising insight: “There is no logical way to the discovery of these elemental laws. There is only the way of intuition, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance.”

  Aspects of Thinking Failures

  The Danger of Permanent Residency in “La La Land”

  The sweeping tendency to interpret reality appearances through “rose-colored glasses” is like sprinkling powdered sugar on our memories. This tendency is also called the “Pollyanna syndrome,” after the literary character who never notices a dark cloud in the sky of her life. Such a tendency might carry calamity seeds of self-deceit. Gambling agents are grateful for this tendency every day.

  In a light spirit of wishful thinking that tends toward too-optimistic interpretation of reality, a common, humoristic saying in bachelorhood tradition is “A woman who walks with a dog is lonely, while a woman who walks without a dog simply forgot it at home”—therefore, the duty of every decent bachelor is to try to ease the widespread loneliness.

  In previous times in history, life presented to our species a much narrower scope of options. The amount of information we needed in order to solve our day-to-day problems was smaller than today. The complexity of required processing was also usually lower compared to what is required from the brain of an average twenty-first century Homo sapiens.

  Complex probabilities were not usually required in previous times in history; thus, our brain is not equipped with a set of mental tools designed for complex statistic processing.

  Often, probabilistic discretion does not come naturally to our brain, and so the task of statistic inference is sometimes difficult for it to perform.

  We have difficulties with rational probabilistic thinking in uncertain conditions. When we consider our alternatives, we tend to make decisions according to heuristics.

  An anecdote that can illustrate the obstacles of predicting the future and the capricious nature of destiny is told about a doctor who shared with his colleague his conflict related to terminating a woman’s pregnancy. It happened at the end of the eighteenth century. The woman’s husband had syphilis, and she had tuberculosis; their first child was born blind, the second died at a young age, the third one was born deaf, and the fourth had tuberculosis as well. The reaction of the colleague was to say, “I would terminate the pregnancy.” The doctor then said, “If I had, I would have sentenced Beethoven to death.”

  Our brain is directed at the sensational and dedicates to such events attention and processing resources that are very much exaggerated according to statistic logic and risk management philosophy, which is based on common sense. All types of journalism thrive as a result of this tendency of our brain.

  Often we are caught in the trap of illusionary correlations, and then noncausal correlations are perceived as causal ones.

  “In-depth interpretation” sometimes adds an artificial dimension that does not exist in its absence. Many of our deeds, especially habitual reactions, lack the symbolic depth that is sometimes linked to them. Often our actions are the result of a momentary condition of the brain’s parallelogram of forces, when the action patterns of neurons that were resurrected at a certain moment lack the depth dimension that is sometimes added to them in retrospect as an interpretive act.

  We must not confuse between what is eloquent and pleasant to our ears and the factual truth.

  Subliminal priming (information that affects us before we make a decision, which we are not aware of since it does not reach our consciousness) is one of the factors that are hidden from the eye of consciousness and might cause the perception of noncausal correlation as a causal one.

  Central components i
n our behavior derive from subconscious processes that evaded consciousness. Often, such a behavior is justified teleologically in retrospect. We do not understand many of our responses, especially those that are colored in intense shades of emotions, and sometimes we are required to explain ourselves to ourselves. Sometimes the retrospective explanation is erroneous, since it creates an erroneous cognitive-emotional correlation.

  At the time of occurrence, events develop from beginning to end, while, when we consider them in historical view, we observe them from end to beginning, in inverted direction. Thus, it seems that our bias of retrospective wisdom is built in, which colors the events in a more deterministic shade and darkens the shades of randomality.

  Sometimes our brain inverts the direction of the arrow of time, and we err by inverting cause-and-effect relations.

  Entire life philosophies are based on so-called identification of “order patterns” within the white noise of randomality. These philosophies build, through selective gathering of convenient findings, an evidence-based infrastructure that supports their worldview. Whole lives move along paths of “absolute truths,” which are nothing but white noise. Or, alternately, whole lives are based on using claims deriving from an axiomatic doctrine that precedes the facts and is not affected by them. This is conceptual paleontology—fossilization of thought, in the sense of adhering to a conceptual dogma in an uncompromising, inflexible manner that lasts even in the absence of factual support, or even when the facts contradict it.

  Our basic tendency is to trust. This is the default of our perception. It is easier for us to trust than to doubt. A claim we hear, and do not have any previous knowledge about, will be considered true until proven otherwise.