Neurobiology and Behavior, Week 9

Last class brought up a lot of interesting points. I thought about the idea that our cultures are getting homogenized. To a certain extent, I feel that it is possible. I am a Bengali, and I know a lot of Bengalis that grow up outside of West Bengal or Bangladesh that speak the language of the place they grew up at. When language is not enforced at home, it is lost. With geographical location changes, the cultural validity of a place is in certain ways altered or lost. Having been brought up an Indian though, I find myself leaning towards experiences that have elements of my culture in them in this country. (Eating food that is closest to the kind I am used to back home, loving crowded places, etc). In a certain way, my brain is typecast into my culture. Even if I were to spend the rest of my life in other countries, I will still keep looking for these elements. In that sense, heterogeneity is not lost. I wonder though, to what extent can the brain still hold on to one culture, and how much of it depends on the age of the person? Genes probably have a role to play too.

I find the idea of the I Function as a filter put forward by drichard very interesting. It helps me make a lot of sense of what the I Function is about.

Also, I wonder whether evolutionarily, humans should have come to a set point which is the most conducive to their healthy functioning. Obesity is a problem, as earlier noted, and having a high set point is not beneficial to the person because of the risks it has. Is it possible to arrive at lower set points for humans? I know we discussed that there are certain advantages to having a higher set-point, but it seems as if a lower one is far more beneficial. I also wonder about the anthropological significance of different set points in different cultures. How much of it is culturally related? How much is dependent on environmental conditions?

What stuck with me after our discussion in class was Ilja's worry that diversity in this world disappearing. The way I can make a general border for diversity is by using different countries. Though I understand that some countries are more similar and some countries are more diverse than each other, for arguments sake, I want to talk about people from different countries. Ilja, I think, talked about the world economy becoming more homogenized which increases the interaction between nations, which in turn creates a more homogenized culture.

I don't think that I can imagine the whole world turning into one culture, but what struck me was that this could possibly happen on a smaller scale. What I mean by this is coming from personal experience. When I lived in Turkey I had a completely different mind-set about life experiences. After I moved to the US this opinion of experiences, the way I experienced life, changed. The reason I know this is because I realized that now I almost have 2 different brains that I can switch on and off with will. If someone asked me a controversial opinion question my answer would depend on whether I am thinking about it as a Turkish person, or whether I'm thinking about it as an American.  

Since we have been talking about the motor neurons and movement of our body in class, I was thinking of the relationship between the muscle movement that does not involve I-function and the external cue from the environment.  Their relationship has been proven in the book called Power vs. Force by Dr. Hawkins.

In the book, he states that he discovered the human body instantly responds to the truthful/untruthful statements by muscle testing.  The method of this testing is that a right-handed subject holds his/her left arm (the weak one) and is asked to resist while pushed down by a partner.  The partner says something true or false and then see how easily the arm goes down when pushed.  The result reports when true statement was made such as “my name is ____” the arm stayed relatively firm, whereas false statement was made such as “I was born on Mars!” the muscle became weak and is more prone to pushed down further.  This proves that the muscles are responsive and sensitive to subtle statements without the involvement of I-function. 

So, I am convinced that even without the I-function we can still behave and most of our behavior made throughout our life is from subconscious/unconscious.  I found it very interesting.

I hope to learn more about how our learning can be made without the huge involvement of I-function.  I had believed that the learning process of our brain starts from our reinforcement or strong I-function.  For example, planning out the exam study schedule or what to ask in class, etc.  However, I realized that the best learning can also made from a new sensation, or shocking experience that the brain had never been exposed to:  a new observation.  We’ve mentioned about this in class in which our brain, when introduced with something new (or unexpected), learns.  I think this aspect of learning also involves the big role of unconscious/subconscious part that does not involve I-function.  I am surprised bit by bit whenever I realize the importance of the role of the unconscious/subconscious.

I recently watched the performance of Yu-Na Kim, a gold medalist of The 2009 World Figure Skating Championship held at LA.  Her every single movement was perfect on ice.  Starting the skating since the age of 11, she has repeated practicing and made mistakes (falling down more than 1000 times per year).  I wonder if her I-function is turned on while she is on ice and make double accel. Jumps and so on.

The concept of set points seems intriguing, almost impossible for my to fathom.  I understand the general concept, but like you said in class, if you found out how they are set and/or change you could win the nobel prize.  What I can't fathom is where would these set points even take place.  In cells, in the nervous system, in the brain, or in the muscles.  What makes them the set point rise when one has a fever and how is such a medicine like tylenol supposed to help against fevers(i.e. lower the set point back to normal?) And it seems like there could be hundreds of these set points in ones body to keep it at homeostastis.  

A few times throughout my life I have been awoken during sleep, i am conscious, but my body does not respond to my desired action, similar to a state of paralyzation.  Why is it that my brain is awake, but my body is not.  Why are the corollarry discharges not able to move my muscles when my brain is sending signals for movement.  There is no splice in my spinal cord, so is it just simply my brain is conscious and my body is alseep, and how can one be awake and the other not.  It is not like when u sleep on ur arm and it falls asleep from lack of blood flow.  My body is stuck.

Our discussion about set points and motor movement brought up the issue of control and individuality. I wondered how we can have control over what we do if there is no “coordinator”? If there are set-points determining how your behavior is formed and a degree of randomness associated with our actions? It is hard to imagine the brain working without relating it to yourself, without thinking of it as something that you do and have control over. I feel I should be able to change my set-points and should be able to influence my learning.

After this class though I started thinking about individuality differently. What if these ideas about randomness of behavior, the unconscious part of our learning and coordination within our brain would actually account for our individuality? Following the Harvard Law of Animal behavior it might be that the coordination between different parts of the body, the fact that we do not have one place for movement but several, actually accounts for diversity. The unpredictability and influences of all the different factors gives an individual the freedom to explore and expand on what he/she knows. Since nothing is set in stone, and since we learn through experiencing new things and comparing the inputs with the outputs in our reafferent loops we create our individual selves. Could the unconscious learning, the inputs reflecting the outputs instead of taking away control give us the freedom that we need to behave “as we damned well please”?

In class we discussed how young children do not have fine motor skills. Also a result, children are not able to do some tasks like button a shirt. I think the concept of motor skill development is directly related to speech development. Children cannot produce some sounds and words because they lack muscle coordination. The timing of language development seems to be dependent on motor skill development. 

I wonder if motor skill development occurs during a critical period like language. If a child was prohibited from moving during the period when motor skills usually develop, would they have normal movement as an adult?

People who play sports or an instrument from an early age tend to be better. Is this just practice, or could there be a critical period involved?

I was interested in expanding/further exploring Tuesday's conversation on set-points in relation to hibernating animals and human body weight. Prof. Grobstein suggested that set-points may be responsible for humans being overweight or underweight- that obese individuals have a higher set-point and their body's desire to maintain this set-point makes it very difficult for them to lose weight. There seem to be several problems/questions with this conception. First, why is it so easy for most people to gain weight? Perhaps the set point is not an exact number, but simply a physical state-for example, one of excess weight or having a drive to gain. In contrast, anorectics may have a set-point of being underweight or having a drive to lose. Perhaps a person could be classified as someone who either "stores" or "burns." But that can change... overweight individuals have become anorectic. What explains that shift? In addition, people who are normally "burners" are often able to gain weight for pregnancy (although they may gain much less than someone with the tendency to store). How much control do I have over my set point? It seems that eating/exercise habits may be partially rooted in the subconscious (for example, emotional eating or individuals who just cannot get the motivation to exercise), so maybe the set point is embedded in that part of our brain. Therefore, individuals who decide to lose thirty pounds are only changing their conscious set point. How might one change the unconscious? What is the purpose of the unconscious set point existing? Why would it be evolutionary advantageous?

I'm wondering if set-points might play a role in other areas of homeostatic regulation. For example, mental states like happiness or depression. Might people have a sort of mood set-point? Does medication change that set point or simply ignore it? Perhaps only therapy, which might bring the unconscious into the conscious, can actually change the set-point.

 Finally, what does the idea of set-points say about the mind-over-matter suggestion? Do we have more control over our physical selves than we imagine or less because we need access to our unconscious to achieve this control?

Earlier in the week, we were discussing reflexes and how they were produced.  A thought that came to mind is reflexes that a child is born with but eventually grows out of (like the galant reflex).  I was wondering how reflexes eventually become 'voluntary' functions, and if it was applicable to the mechano-receptors we had been talking about on Tuesday.

The question was also asked if there was a "force" for diversity in the brain.  I find it ironic that no hierarchy/leaders are present in the nervous system.  However, as far as we know, humans have worked with a social structure since the age of the neanderthals.  Perhaps our community of neurons doesn't translate their community into our social behavior; it is merely for structural convenience and doesn't permeate into how we behave socially.