Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Mon, 17 Dec 2012 17:00:00 PST Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120504/17564318790/dailydirt-figuring-out-forgetfulness.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120504/17564318790/dailydirt-figuring-out-forgetfulness.shtml

We know now that memories are stored in specific neurons because genetically engineered mice with light-activated neurons can be made to recall (or forget) when those neurons are activated (or removed). The ethics of "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" technology might be a serious discussion soon. [url]

Marijuana is well-known to have side effects that impair memory functions, but the mechanism hasn't been studied extensively until recently. THC doesn't have much effect on neurons, but instead affects astroglia cells -- interfering with how neurons communicate with each other. [url]

The formation of long-term memories in our brains seems to occur during sleep, transferring from the hippocampus to the neocortex. The communication between these two areas of the brain will be important to study for finding out more about memory storage processes, and we've only started to discover how memories work. [url]

Memory foraging is just one way to think about how our brains recall memories. People tend to remember things in clusters, and knowing this could lead to better ways for people to learn or recall items -- or to build virtual brains that more closely mimic how human brains actually work. [url]

If you have some more free time, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20120504/17564318790 Thu, 13 Dec 2012 17:00:00 PST Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101108/03303411758/dailydirt-learning-more-about-our-brains.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101108/03303411758/dailydirt-learning-more-about-our-brains.shtml

Studies of human brains and closely related primate brains have shown some differences that could point to specific genes responsible (or at least relevant) for the evolution of brain intelligence. Next stop, planet of the apes, folks. [url]

Software can track what you've learned by constantly quizzing you, and apparently the best time to review something you want to memorize is right before you're about to forget it. Use it or lose it... and now you can precisely quantify when you're about to lose it. [url]

Brain imaging techniques could replace IQ tests someday by predicting intelligence based on "global brain connectivity" that seems to correlate with the ability to perform challenging tasks. Taking the SAT in the future might not involve number 2 pencils, but instead a few hours in an MRI machine.... [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101108/03303411758 Wed, 22 Aug 2012 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100408/0928168935/dailydirt-making-memories.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100408/0928168935/dailydirt-making-memories.shtml forget. Here are just a few interesting links on making (and un-making) some memories.

• People with superior autobiographical memory can remember an amazing amount, but they're not savants, nor do they have photographic memories or use common memory tricks. Many of them also exhibit obsessive-compulsive tendencies, but researchers have only extensively studied about a dozen subjects with this ability so far. [url]
• Currently, implanting false memories in lab mice involves some combination of genetic engineering, boxes, electrical shocks, brain implants and drug injections, and these procedures aren't recommended for humans (yet). Ten points for re-writing that sentence as a Tom Swifty. [url]
• Erasing painful memories could be helpful for some people, but if reliable techniques are developed to make people forget certain events, what would people choose to remove? Therapeutic forgetting has some obvious benefits, but there could be unintended consequences for criminal trials and witness testimonies. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100408/0928168935 Tue, 15 May 2012 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100526/1501069588/dailydirt-what-do-you-remember.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100526/1501069588/dailydirt-what-do-you-remember.shtml

An analysis of IMDB's memorable movie quotes could help figure out what makes well-written dialogue so catchy. Not surprisingly, the most popular catchphrases have unusual combinations of words and often express some pearls of wisdom. "Do. Or Do not. There is no try." [url]

USA Memory Champ Ron White shows off how he memorizes the order of a deck of shuffled playing cards -- creating a unique sentence for each card that helps him remember how every card relates to its neighbors. He uses a spatial memory technique called method of loci, but it probably doesn't work for everyone (especially people who get lost a lot). [url]

Children remember more than adults think they do, but nobody remembers their second birthday party. A study on the memories of Disney World revealed that 3 year old kids remembered a lot about the happiest place on Earth (even 18 months after visiting). [url]

To discover more interesting articles on the human mind, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100526/1501069588 Tue, 27 Mar 2012 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100321/2126118642/dailydirt-i-want-new-drug.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100321/2126118642/dailydirt-i-want-new-drug.shtml

A protein named the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) seems to be correlated with exercise and improved memory. But exercise is hard, so there'll be plenty of BDNF pills and 'Flowers for Algernon' situations to look forward to. [url]

Taking drugs like Ritalin and caffeine might provide a temporary boost to mental abilities, but R&D efforts to discover a pill that permanently improves brain function are likely futile. Pharmaceutical companies benefit more from treatments rather than cures, anyway. [url]

Air Force researchers have figured out a way to reduce training time by 50% -- using mild electrical currents delivered to pilots' heads. The technique uses transcranial direct current stimulation (TDCS), and the treated pilots have been reported to say, "I know Kung Fu" in a Keanu-like way. [url]

To discover more interesting articles on the human mind, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100321/2126118642 Tue, 19 Jul 2011 21:59:00 PDT Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110718/00270215121/no-google-is-not-rewiring-how-we-remember.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110718/00270215121/no-google-is-not-rewiring-how-we-remember.shtml Google is rewiring how we remember. It sounds good, but it's not really what the study appears to be saying. Basically, the study is saying that we just don't work as hard at remembering stuff we know we can access again easily. But I don't see that as rewiring. I think that's always been true. It's the same thing as people not remembering their multiplication tables as carefully, because they know they have a calculator. If anything, it just seems like an efficient use of your brain. The report also notes that people have an easier time remembering where to find certain info than they do remembering the info itself. But, again, that's just our brains being efficient. So I don't see how that's rewiring anything. It's just a recognition that, thanks to the internet and other technologies, we can have near ubiquitous access to certain kinds of info, and we function better by remembering how to find it, rather than the info itself. In fact, we've discussed this before, about how people quite reasonably use things like Google as their backup brain and how that actually has some benefits.

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]]> let-it-go http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110718/00270215121 Mon, 6 Jun 2011 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110504/13480514145/dailydirt-studying-gray-matter-before-we-hack-it.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110504/13480514145/dailydirt-studying-gray-matter-before-we-hack-it.shtml

Australian researchers think that genes may explain how 'cost-efficient' our brains are -- and ultimately how genes affect cognitive abilities. Hopefully, no one finds and patents the 'genius' genes... [url]

The iBrain is not a new product from Apple -- it's a nifty device that records data from your brain in order to diagnose various neurological disorders. Once it's collected enough data, though, maybe it'll help in figuring out how regular brains work, too. [url]

Sleep deprivation has been demonstrated to reduce a mouse's ability to retain memories. So try to get a good night's sleep before making any best-laid plans with mice. [url]

To discover more interesting articles on the human mind, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110504/13480514145 Mon, 16 May 2011 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110110/11142812590/dailydirt-brains-are-like-cracked-eggs-hot-skillet.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110110/11142812590/dailydirt-brains-are-like-cracked-eggs-hot-skillet.shtml

Just about everyone suffers from several common cognitive errors... And now you know, and knowing is half the battle. [url]

Researchers can mess with the memories of rats -- making memories fade faster or last longer. But injecting a memory-enhancing virus into a human brain doesn't sound too appealing. [url]

Researchers in Germany have found a single "giant" neuron in the brain of locusts that seems to collect all olfactory input -- a discovery that could lead to a better understanding of how biological neural nets work. Mammal brains could possibly have similar neural structures, but there's obviously a big difference between the brains of insects and mammals... [url]

To discover more interesting articles on the human mind, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110110/11142812590 Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:33:00 PST Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20091214/2322287346.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20091214/2322287346.shtml Slashdot comes the news of some breakthroughs in plastic flash memory. It's obviously still very early, and there are some limitations on the technology right now, but the potential makes it quite a worthwhile technology to follow. While it may not ever match what silicon flash memory can do in terms of storage and stability, plastic memory could provide some new and fascinating options for implementation, mainly in being a lot more flexible. That means it could be integrated into all sorts of new things -- including electronic paper and other offerings. Of course, the trickiest part in understanding new disruptive technologies is often in thinking about what sorts of new products it would allow. So it would be great to hear from folks what they think flexible, plastic memory might allow, and how it might change certain markets.

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]]> what's-next http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20091214/2322287346 Thu, 4 Jun 2009 15:10:00 PDT Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090604/0203115126.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090604/0203115126.shtml Mathew Ingram points to an internal memo at the NY Times where it says that due to Tweetdeck's memory issues, the paper is asking employees not to use it anymore -- though, to their credit, it doesn't appear to be a demand, but a request. On top of that, the NY Times suggests that other apps can do the job. That may be true, but I've tested a bunch of different competing apps (hoping they could get over Tweetdeck's other shortcomings) but I'm back on Tweetdeck because those other apps have even more problems, but Ingram again explains the better solution: "I agree that Tweetdeck can be a memory hog, and can sympathize with the NYT-- but the solution is buy more RAM, not exclude Tweetdeck."

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]]> backwards-thinking http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20090604/0203115126 Tue, 11 Dec 2007 08:16:34 PST Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20071209/185200.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20071209/185200.shtml a secondary or "backup" brain for many people. However, perhaps it wasn't so much of a joke. New research on how human memory and recall works suggests that the process is quite similar to Google's PageRank in determining what things are more important and should be recalled first. Basically, Google's PageRank looks at "popularity," not just in terms of how many links a site gets, but also in terms of how popular those links are. Thus, if you get linked from a more popular site, that's more valuable than getting linked by a bunch of non-popular sites. It turns out that the brain does something similar in linking concepts, judging not just the popularity, but the popularity of the concepts linked to the concepts. In fact, using Google's PageRank turned out to be a better predictor of how a brain would prioritize words than more commonly known methods.

This could be an interesting finding for the artificial intelligence community. After all, many in the AI community have been trying to figure out how to make computers act more like human brains for years, and various brute force methods haven't worked all that well. Obviously, the AI world has worked on various neural net research for quite some time, but it's nice to see at least some confirmation from the psychology side concerning a way to match up brains and algorithms. A couple years ago, we noted that intelligence was often correlated to people who knew what to forget rather than trying to remember everything. What that really shows is that good brains are better at prioritizing and ranking the importance of something -- and that's exactly what PageRank is intended to do. So, now, we just need Larry Page to get back from his honeymoon and get to work on BrainRank. Or would that be PageBrain? Of course, it's also worth noting that with the rise of search engine spamming, rumor has it that Google doesn't use PageRank that much any more. Perhaps that just means that our brains are vulnerable to concept spamming as well...

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]]> what's-your-brainrank? http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20071209/185200 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 22:30:00 PDT Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20071011/225126.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20071011/225126.shtml backup or second brain. The more we use these technologies, the more we allow them to remember stuff for us -- knowing we can always track down that information. In fact, Clive Thompson's latest column is about how the generation of kids growing up online tend not to remember little things that older generations definitely remember, like phone numbers and birthdays. Why remember those things when they're easily stored away and easily accessed thanks to technology? While Thompson talks about how nice it is that he can feel much smarter while he's connected, he also worries that it makes him "mentally crippled" when not connected. There may be something to that idea. After all, a few years ago there was a story about Steve Mann, a professor who had been living his life with a wearable computing system for 20 years. At an airport, he was forced to take the apparatus off and immediately had trouble functioning normally. He had become so reliant on the technological enhancements, that being without them left him somewhat crippled. While few people will have reached that point, it's certainly suggestive of what happens if we become too reliant on those external backup brains. That's not to say we shouldn't be using technology for this purpose -- or even that it's not a good thing. However, we should be aware of what it means and potentially the impact should it go away (temporarily or permanently).

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]]> i'd-say-it's-bad,-but-my-computer-disagrees... http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20071011/225126