Now we realize that the human brain is far from fixed, at any level.
If genes and a fixed structure of brain cells told the whole story, it would remain a total mystery why a cave dweller after the last Ice Age should have just the right complement of neurons to discover gravity or write a symphony. Their foundation was a new relationship between mind and body. But in those 10,000 years arose reading, writing, advanced art and music, government, mathematics and science. Ten thousand years ago, Homo sapiens had evolved the same genetic array that modern people inherit. But the highest goal would be to reinvent how we use our brains. The more we know about what goes wrong in Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, the closer we get to a cure. The slant in neuroscience has been to map the brain down to the tiniest detail.īut what will we use the map for? One obvious area is medicine. For example, researchers can spot the minuscule area in the visual cortex that, when damaged, prevents a person from recognizing faces, including his own. Thanks to brain scans like the fMRI, brain activity can be localized and even the most precise activity pinpointed. We’re living in a golden age for brain research, which could revolutionize how we think, feel and behave.
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