I was just surfing on youtube and found this video about how if you regularly USE your brain, it will have a greater number of cells than if you didn’t “exercise it”. The speaker is Leonard Peikoff. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6OmJur0b0g…feature=related
Rob
I was just surfing on youtube and found this video about how if you regularly USE your brain, it will have a greater number of cells than if you didn’t “exercise it”. The speaker is Leonard Peikoff. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6OmJur0b0g…feature=related
One of the founding members of my OPAR Study Group is studying neurology, and there is now a lot more evidence that not only the growth of new cells but also their network connections changes over time depending on what one does with one’s brain, as in thinking or not thinking. The connections between brain cells is constantly changing which parallels what happens when one makes new mental connections. There is also evidence that those with neurological disabilities will improve more the more they become cognitively active; and as that video demonstrated with mice, the more one becomes a hermit and withdraws from the world, the less brain power one will have. That’s one reason I recommend those who have neurological disabilities become not only mentally active, but also become more interactive with the world rationally. It has even been demonstrated that those who have had a stroke are more likely to recover if they remain cognitively active rather than just giving up on the world because they have a disability.
As I have mentioned before, just because one might have a neurological problem, that does not change the requirements of being human. The virtues still apply, it’s just more difficult for those with neurological problems. And the more cognitive they become, which means not just thinking but having to deal with new situations rationally, the more likely they are to recover.
We are still in the early stage of explicitly identifying how all of this works scientifically, but by observation, if someone older keeps mentally active, he is more likely to come across as having a young healthy mind when compared to someone who just sits around in retirement.