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Forgotten But Not Gone: How The Brain Re-learns

sciencedaily.com — Thanks to our ability to learn and to remember, we can perform tasks that other living things can not even dream of. However, we are only just beginning to get the gist of what really goes on in the brain when it learns or forgets something. What we do know is that changes in the contacts between nerve cells play an important role.

Who dugg this? Made popular Nov 23, 2008

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  • m4csrgh3yk3v, on 11/23/2008, -0/+7One of the strangest memories is sitting down at the piano after not playing a song for a few years and not having a clue how to play it. Played around for a few minutes and then all of a sudden the hands knew exactly where to go but I hadn't a clue of the notes I was playing and couldn't look where they were going or I would stuff it up.
  • inactive, on 11/22/2008, -1/+4Go humans! Although, this ability to relearn eluded me when I took up the guitar again after four years off. Maybe that's because I was never good in the first place.
  • Encablossa, on 11/23/2008, -0/+2Translation: Where all the fat, desperate and child molesters lay! Yeah go for it!
  • hamderhallas, on 11/23/2008, -1/+3I used to play a good deal of Guitar Hero 2 and 3, then I didnt touch it for nearly 13 months, picked it up at a friends party and somehow I was actually better than ever. Of course took me 1-2 minutes to get into gear,but once I started I absolute rocked ;) We're talking Hard/Expert here of course.
  • virtualonliner, on 11/23/2008, -0/+2"new cell contacts established during a learning process stay put, even when they are no longer required. The reactivation of this temporarily inactivated "stock of contacts" enables a faster learning of things forgotten."

    What? Then why does it take the same time every night to retrain myself to log off of digg?
  • theadvinci, on 11/23/2008, -0/+2Speaking of taking up the guitar. That's what I'm gonna do now. And I better remember how to play it or this article is wrong.
  • desertDenizen, on 11/24/2008, -0/+1I'm encouraged by Prosumer Nation's take on this finding, good news for becoming a "lay expert" and a knowledgeable generalist because the brain has more capacity than we'd imagined thanks to the sleeping/unused neurons and their ability to be reakened when needed. Cool stuff:

    http://prosumernation.com/
  • Mujokan, on 11/23/2008, -1/+2Makes sense. It is not like there is any reason to evolve a "wipe" facility to reset connections. It's most efficient to leave them set up as they are, until they need to be reused; but the strength of the connections might naturally decay through entropy unless reinforced by use.

    I envisage memory as essentially mechanical, like Babbage's difference engine. The medium is the message, in other words. Memories aren't "put" anywhere; it's more like the arrangement of neurons serves a particular function -- gives a certain result when "called".
  • Ratteler, on 11/23/2008, -2/+3Great!!! As soon as the RIAA/MPAA hook up with pharmaceutical, they'll be able to charge us to remember our songs and movies.
    And since we supported copyright terrorists by buying their products even after we realized they were pirating our public domain inheritance with eternal copyrights, there will be nothing we can do it about it.
  • audreysee, on 11/23/2008, -0/+1I think it's also different if you learn something well and if you only learn something for small amount of time.
  • LondonBridge, on 11/23/2008, -0/+1good arguments...
  • LondonBridge, on 11/23/2008, -1/+1Optimistic research study. It'll be interesting to see if these results can be put into use to help Alzheimer patients.
  • newms32, on 11/23/2008, -2/+1"Nerve cells that process visual information, for instance, produced a considerably higher number of new cell contacts if the flow of information from their "own" eye was temporarily blocked. After approximately five days, the nerve cells had rearranged themselves so as to receive and process information from the other eye - the brain had resigned itself to having only one eye at its disposal. Once information flowed freely again from the eye that had been temporarily closed, the nerve cells resumed their original function and now more or less ignored signals from the alternative eye."

    I have a degree in Neuroscience and I have no idea what the hell they're talking about. Neurons, eyes...? Just say what's really going on and stop abstracting things into concepts that are "easier" to understand.

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