During the first ten minutes of class, write a summary of John Medina’s Brain Rules, “Wiring” chapter. According to Medina, what does he mean by wiring? Is it fixed or changing? What leads to it taking place?
ENG1101 D371 English Composition I, SPR2015
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Our brains each have a unique wiring. Based on what we learn, how and the events surrounding it, our brain wires itself differently. The neurons in out brain are responsible for the wiring in our brain. We go through a growth sprout during our terrible twos and teen years. Wiring is never set, the more we learn the more connections and wires our brain makes. The brain sends electric currents to cells and neurons in order to store information and enable learning. Everyone’s brain is wired to be able to do something and be good at it, and this is not affected by a person’s IQ level.
After reading John Medina’s Brain Rules Wiring chapter, Medina points out that no two people has the same brain, not even twins. Everyone’s brain are wired differently. When Medina says wired differently he means that not everyone thinks the same thoughts or react the same to certain things or even have the same personality. Our wiring is not fixed to stay the same either. Our wiring constantly changes overtime. Certain things that we experience or learn leads to our brains wiring and re-wiring forming new connections and new memories while keeping the old memories. It’s amazing how our brain wires new connections each time we experience something.
Reading John Medina’s Brain Rules chapter on “Wiring” I learned that everyone’s perspective is different even after reading or watching the same thing. Twins for example may watch the same film and they both will have different perspectives of the film. Our brain changes over time as we learn new things. Everyone’s brain is completely different and certain words can trigger different parts of our brain that would help us vision an object.
Base on Medina’s chapter “wiring”, everything you do in life physically changes what your brain looks like. We all understand and see things differently, which mean no one brain is physically identical to someone else, even twins brother or sisters. Wiring in this concept means re-arranging the neurons of our memories. Wiring changes overtime because we are experiencing new things every day. The development of wiring evolves at different rate in different people. Everyone’s brains store memories in different ways and places. People have different ways of being intelligent, so a person IQ level does not really describe his/her intelligence.
In the chapter, Wiring. Medina talks about how the brain rewires and shapes itself depending on your physical activities, different functions of the neurons and how they get stimulated in your brain. I found it very interesting how learning rewires our brain. Medina says that human nerves learn the same way sea slug nerves learn. As we learn, our brain swells and splits apart, then connect to other parts of the brain. Medina explains the process of neurons “communicating” by describing it as if I am taking a trip in the hippocampus and witnessing the process. He says that two neurons enter the synapsis cleft. Then, a group of molecules, called neurotransmitters, exists one neuron and transfers information to the other neuron. The other neuron electrically responds negatively or positively. Then, the neurotransmitters returns to the neuron it exited from. As the synapsis cleft happens, the part of the brain that the neurons are receiving information swells up. I also found it interesting that Medina explains how certain physical activities shapes our brain. He says that in the brain of violin players, the areas where they use they left hand for the most complex movements are enlarged and crisscrossed, whereas the areas controlling the right hand are thin. I thought about how my basketball career shaped my brain. I figured that the areas of my brain where I learned the most complex tricks and practiced more with my right hand are enlarged and the areas where I used my left hand are thin.
No two people in this world have the same type of brain not even twins. In this chapter John Medina talks about what he calls the wiring of our brain. The way we live our life and react to certain situations make up how you brain turns out. Your brain is constantly wiring itself throughout your life which makes your brain different from the next persons. The way we react or comprehend a situation can be completely different from the next person even if we are experiencing the same things. Reading this chapter really surprised me especially the part about even twins having completely different wiring in their brain. He also speaks about how physical activity can change the shape of your brain. Practicing a certain exercise like playing the violin can enlarge a certain part of your brain where as an athlete can have the completely opposite side of the brain enlarged because the difference of the practices.
In the chapter “Wiring”, Medina explained how our brain change whenever we learn something new. This is due to the nerve cells we produce in our body. Nerve cells also called neurons, communicate to each other, and rewire in a very fast pace. Medina also explained how identical twins even though they are born on the same time, they are not wired the same way. Different experiences and knowledge makes every human being unique. Unless if two beings are experiencing the same things and viewing the same experience the same way, they would not have the same wiring. Even then, I believe the twins still will not have the same wiring. Medina mentioned two types of brain wiring, experience dependent, and experience independent. These different types of wiring makes the brains unique. Some people can do one or the other and some can do better than others can. Like learning, a new language for example, it is wired by independent wiring, smaller paths, which are hardwired into the brain, harder to access as you, get older.
In the chapter Wiring , Medina talks about how every individual have a unique wiring in their brain. Our brain rewires and shapes differently depending on our environment and the activities. Medina gives the example of twins who share the same genes but their brain develops differently due to the different experience that they had in the life. It is the same for two persons watching the same movie together but their point of view of each will be different about that movie due to different neurons in the mind. The wiring in our brain never says the same it changes as we go through different experiences, even every individual stores their memories in different places in the mind.
In John Medina’s, “Brain Rules,” Medina discusses how no two brains are alike, not even twins! He goes on to explain about how one’s brain is uniquely “wired” which brings us to “Brain Rule #5: Wiring, Every brain is wired differently.” Medina explains how what we learn and how we develop in life physically can “wire” our brain, change its form. To explain this process of “wiring”, he takes us animatedly through the anatomy of the brain. While I was reading this section, it reminded me of the books and television show, “The Magic School Bus.” The wiring of the brain is constantly changing over our developmental years. During our developmental years, we are constantly learning and experiencing new things, which leads to wiring taking place. Medina explains different types of wiring, experience- dependent and experience-independent. Experience- dependent wiring is influenced by our details or experiences in life. To best explain this wiring, Medina describes twins watching the same movie. Both are interpreting the movie differently because one twin read up on an article of an actress in the film prior to watching it and the other twin did not, giving them totally different experiences on the film, which leads to different wiring. Experience- independent wiring is based on our biological function, the air in which we breathe and rate in which our heart pumps. These elements happen on their own without being influenced by any particular thing, hence them being independent. Everyone stores information in their brain differently, hence on why our brains are wired differently.
What you do and learn in life physically changes what your brain
looks like it literally rewires it. The various regions of the brain develop at different rates in
different people so we don’t ever think alike or that’s how basically everyone judges us that this person is smart and this one is not. No two people’s brains store the same information in the same way
in the same place.We have a great number of ways of being intelligent, many of which
don’t show up on IQ tests, so IQ tests are not the most efficient ways to tell how smart you are. Every person has their own knowledge and intelligence which makes them different than the others.
The human brain is full of knowledge; connectors between different parts of the brain form this knowledge. These connections could be called neural pathways, carrying neurons between different parts of the brain. The connections are complex chemical and electrical bonds which form throughout the brain; specific patterns being specific memories and/or thoughts. If you’re one for analogies, imagine an old telephone switchpanel, you know, the one with an operator; each wire being a connector, each port a possible connection point. When a person learns a new thing, the brain changes physically and electrically. The physical aspect is that the folds and creases of ones brain change. Electrically speaking, the voltage and amperage might spike or drop. If I was to teach a bird to talk, then dissect its brain, I would find that the folds and creases are more profound. The brain is a complex bit of human engineering. Our memories, thoughts, and life can be controlled by it. When you make a mistake, your brain normally learns from it. You might just make a different mistake. Think of small electronics, specifically breadboards, many wires crossing and forming a certain circuit. A common misnomer is that a bigger brain leads to increased intellect, but this is unfounded. The connections between different parts of the brain are what define our intellect. The brain is a complete circuit. The brain also likes to learn, like a sponge soaking up some water. Do what you will, your brain is still your brain.