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MIT: New theory on how brain learns
web.mit.edu — Brain uses both neural 'teacher' and 'tinkerer' networks in learning. While most people need peace and quiet to cram for a test, the brain itself may need noise to learn, a recent MIT study suggests. In experiments with monkeys, the researchers found that neural activities in the brain gradually change, even when nothing new is being learned.
GilbertZ- 1029 diggs
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- Jeifurie, on 10/11/2007, -25/+3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain
People on Digg don't seem to have or know what a brain is.- simonwo, on 10/11/2007, -20/+2LOLZ U MAK n0 SENzE!!! LOLOLOLOLOL
- Kranklin, on 10/11/2007, -4/+7Well that explains how people can have sudden bursts of inspiration, or remember where they left their car keys.
- Anrkist, on 10/11/2007, -6/+7BRAINS!
- Tamriel, on 10/11/2007, -1/+4@Achalemoipas
Are you being sarcastic? I can't even tell...
Seriously, genetically we are so similar to monkeys it scares the ***** out of any educated creationist. And brain-wise the structures are the same. Humans have larger brains and certain areas are shaped differently, but they're very similar when you compare them to any lower order mammal... let alone any any non-mammalian animal.
- simonwo, on 10/11/2007, -20/+2LOLZ U MAK n0 SENzE!!! LOLOLOLOLOL
- jmkiii, on 10/11/2007, -4/+17Monkeys need noise to cram for tests?
- Daedalus81, on 10/11/2007, -6/+9Maybe i'm a monkey, but I was never ever able to think when it was dead quiet. Even when I program I play music.
- chaesar, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11Woah woah people! They did tests on MONKEYS and figured it'd be the same as for people. What kind of America-hating science-fiction ***** is this!??!?! I don't know about you all but the jury isn't in on evolution as far as I'm concerned.
/Jerry Falwell sarcasm - 1longtime, on 10/11/2007, -0/+9This article has nothing to do with noise. If you interpreted that this article was talking about audible noise, then the "tinkerer" neural net in your brain just messed up the meaning. Don't worry, the "teacher" neural net will go back and correct it shortly.
*waits*
(That naughty little "tinkerer" neural net is the learning "noise" in the article, but not a literal audible sound.) - simpleid, on 10/11/2007, -1/+3Programming and music go to together better than.... peas and carrots. :-)
- bakstuh, on 10/11/2007, -3/+1I've always needed entropy around me to learn...
- theheights, on 10/11/2007, -10/+5Does "noise" include alcohol?
- soratobou, on 10/11/2007, -9/+0New most quoted by students to parents: "the brain itself may need noise to learn."
Segues nicely into "no I can't turn it down, my brain needs to learn". - MikeonTV, on 10/11/2007, -14/+0They are still doing studies on the brain?
- brookolatesla, on 10/11/2007, -3/+0These guys need to wikipedia "mirror neurons".
- ryannerd, on 10/11/2007, -11/+3When I was a teenager I had been telling my folks for years that I need back ground noise or I would not be able to study. Of course background noise back then consisted of MTV blaring from the TV in my room (you know back when the "M" in MTV was an acronym for Music).
- chaesar, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3Woah off-topic
- neuropsychguy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+33Let me summarize the article for those who don't want to read it:
The researchers are saying that the neural activity in our brains associated with learning has two systems: the first is a general "background noise" (it seems to be fairly passive) that slowly changes how the brain represents the world (think of this like a glacier slowly carving its way down a mountain); the second is directly associated with active learning - the "teacher" mode - and is pretty much what we currently view as neuronal response to learning. In other words, the thing that is new about this research is the need for the background noise (not external noise - this is the "noise" of neuronal electrical activity) to learn.
If that didn't make a lot of sense, try this. The neurons in our brains are always active - we have a certain resting level of electrical (and chemical) activity. When we are awake and actively thinking this activity resonates at a higher frequency (more Hertz). The researchers are saying that they believe that this "background noise" - the normal all-the-time neuronal activity is important in learning and that its patterns shift over time in response to learning.
That's the best I could do without actually reading the research article (if there is one yet). Who knows if it really is accurate - news releases about research are inaccurate enough that they shouldn't be blindly accepted.- neuropsychguy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Edit: The research was published in the May 24, 2007 edition of Neuron (I missed that the first time through the article). I've had a chance to read the actual article (well, skim at least) - it's quite good and quite compelling.
- edm1950, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0So like moving your lips while you read actually helps?
- optigon, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Thank you! My community college brain was overwhelmed by their ivy league information!
- mythosmc, on 10/11/2007, -2/+1now the question is, what is the optimal frequency of background noise for best learning :)
- Derrekito, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binaural_beats
- kaiser44, on 10/11/2007, -7/+2does anybody besides me find these Snorg girls distracting, in a good way. A Mit study also show's that I want to lick her belly.
- orangenomad, on 10/11/2007, -5/+0i wish i could go to MIT.
- sensical, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2All they've discovered is that we learn best by conceiving of things in multiple ways. Leave it to scientists to make such a simple thing incomprehensible.
- ku16610, on 10/11/2007, -3/+1This kinda makes sense , I tend to code better if i`m listening to banging music up loud.
- john95127, on 10/11/2007, -3/+1Oops, I'm always yelling at my son not to study with his iPod blasting away.
- fatkiduluv, on 10/11/2007, -2/+3What frequency are the test subjects brain waves at when they throw poop at each other?
- haggie, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Depends on which fraternity they belong to...
- geronimo, on 10/11/2007, -0/+8As someone who just had a few nails driven into his head, this is reassuring. This reasearch says that the brain can 'tinker', find new pathways and overcome injuries, and function just fine. That is what I observed, the first week was spent in a daze, after that things returned mostly to normal. This also has ramifications for neural network software models.
- almalax19, on 10/11/2007, -1/+6WTF?????
- geronimo, on 10/11/2007, -1/+10"WTF"
That's what I said.
- slayernine, on 10/11/2007, -1/+0I agree with chaesar why test monkey brains they aren't exactly the same as ours. Screw ethics lets open up some cerebellums and get some science going. JK But really what do scientist know about the brain. We are still working out the basics and are know where near understanding the exact science of it.
- slapthemonkey, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1Very interesting article.
- hiPpymIck, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2FTA
"....measured neural activities in the motor cortex while monkeys manipulated a handle to move a cursor to targets on a screen...."
hmm..sounds familiar - Ianki, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I really wish that articles describing scientific findings would be responsible enough to cite the work they are trying to explain.
Regardless, at the end it sounded as if the researchers coded a nice connectionist system to model their findings, although their whole theory reeks of connectionism from the start. "teacher" and "tinkerer" might as well be "randomly distributed feedback learning". Why do we have to over complicate a methodology that already works? - empath, on 10/11/2007, -2/+0THat's neat. It sounds like that's the origin of metaphor.
Teacher: That's an airplane/machine.
Tinkerer: That's an animal
Teacher: That's like an animal/bird. - r3bol, on 10/11/2007, -1/+0mmmm...brains
- Undiculous, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Here's the part that I don't understand about the whole learning process: How do the tinker and teacher communicate? In the examples from TFA, it's as though it's two people sitting down having a conversation where the tinker proposes grammatical sentences and the teacher corrects the sentences with no regard to diction if the tinker makes a mistake.
Even though when we force ourselves to think we can hear ourselves speak and if we think aloud we are putting ideas into words, but what about when we are babies and don't have language skills yet? We definitely are learning an extraordinary amount, but it can't be with language. A lot of thinking and information processing is done subconsciously, so it just seems counterintuitive to imagine our brain really discussing with itself like that. What is it really like? - aliensporebomb, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Interesting - this explains possibly why when I learn something it ends up being an "equate" to something
else. The Zen masters say "know one thing, know everything" but they may have been more correct than
we know. Especially with computers or an operating in different operating systems, I might see something
in Linux and association it with a similar operation on Mac OS X or Windows and my brain lumps the entire
thing together as "one thing". - rharris, on 10/11/2007, -0/+0Interesting. It sounds like the brain's neural nets have encoded a genetic programming mechanism for learning: make up random stuff, test it, throw out the bad, modify the less bad, repeat.
Real genetics builds a neural network to simulate genetics. - yomamaisfat, on 10/11/2007, -1/+1I have no idea what this article says, but I'll digg it since it feels important.
- mydave, on 07/24/2008, -0/+0interesting, but let this problems with sounds will solve scientists.
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