How brain changes
Brain’s depth has become shallow. This happens mainly due to the way how people live. People use computers through Operating Systems such as Linux, Windows, etc. It is now extremely simpler in generating media compared to 100 years ago. One can type words using keyboards and edit very easily. Also, drawing paint is a piece of cake. You have the infinite option of colors using hexadecimal color codes and can select among different paint brushes, pencils, and everything. Moreover, thanks to the power of the transformer, language models generate decent-quality of writes. A stable diffusion algorithm supports generating creative and unique drawings, too. Searching for information is so simple that you can google or simply ask one of GPT models. Reading through lots of books is already an old story.
A philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, fell from a horse during his military service in Preußen. Because of this injury, he had to resign the professor position in 1879. He also suffered from his bad eye-sight, so bought a typer from Malling Hansen in 1882. His friends noticed that Nietzsche’s writing became different after using the typer. Nietzsche realized that writing-tools is a big part of forming how we think.
There has been a debate about whether the brain of an adult changes or not. J.Z Young has published the concept of plasticity of the brain from his research through BBC that human brain gets bigger when it is utilized more and shrinks when not used. Also, Dr. Michale Merzenich made an experiment revealing the secret of the brain with the victim of monkeys. Some parts of the monkey’s brain were removed in his experiments. Initially, the monkey’s brain perceived the touch of the left back as the left arm because of the brain surgery. However, the repetition of stimulation for months, the brain worked properly. Which means brain cell is reconstructed.
Through these research results, we can deduce that brains change based on how we think. It casts a thought to me that we believe that our thoughts come from the brain, but the brain also changes from its byproduct. It reminds me of the infinite loop in programming. If brains can manipulate this mechanism, can one brilliant and disciplined human being behave as if she/he is god? Why there’s no such person?
A philosophical question is good, but the first step for me (as a mundane human being) is not wasting time on trash internet stuff. Invest on meaningful stuff by distinguishing good and bad stuff.
