Hello Everyone » Literature http://www.172med.org Wed, 28 Jul 2010 03:17:33 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 Thoughts http://www.172med.org/thoughts/ http://www.172med.org/thoughts/#comments Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:19:54 +0000 admin http://www.172med.org/?p=23 From didactic meerkats to inequity-averse monkeys, the same observation applies: each of these animals has evolved an exquisite mind that is adapted to singular problems and is thus limited when it comes to applying skills to novel problems. Not so for us hairless bipeds. Once in place, the modern mind enabled our forebears to explore previously uninhabited parts of the earth, to create language to describe novel events, and to envision an afterlife.  The roots of our cognitive abilities remain largely unknown, but having pinpointed the unique ingredients of the human mind, scientists now know what to look for. To that end, I am hopeful that neurobiology will prove illuminating. Although scholars do not yet understand how genes build brains and how electrical activity in the brain builds thoughts and emotions, we are witnessing a revolution in the sciences of the mind that will fill in these blanks and enrich our understanding of why the human brain differs so profoundly from those of other creatures.

For instance, studies of chimeric animals in which brain circuits from an individual of one species are transplanted into an individual of another species are helping to unravel how the brain is wired. And experiments with genetically modified animals are revealing genes that play roles in language and other social processes. Such achievements do not reveal anything about what our nerve cells do to give us our unique mental powers, but they do provide a roadmap for further exploration of these traits.

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