Brain cells can only survive on oxygen and glucose
These two nutrients are incredibly vital to the functioning and survival of the human brain. It takes the brain anywhere from three to five minutes to suffer irreversible damage when it is starved of oxygen or glucose. As Dr. Omalu explains, the brain controls and drives the heart and lungs and controls our consciousness. This is why most deaths are never instant. “Even if a human being is decapitated, the brain does not suffer irreversible damage and death until several minutes after decapitation.”
The brain is not permanently arranged at birth
Nope – those nerve cells in your noggin continue to change based on how often they’re used and stimulated in the first year of life. This is especially true for speech and language. “Some toddlers have to undergo extensive brain resections for medical reasons and these procedures may unfortunately mean removing the primary language centre in the brain,” explains Jennifer Bickel, MD, Paediatric Neurologist and Director of Comprehensive Headache Clinic at Children’s Mercy Kansas City. “If adults undergo a similar procedure, they are often unable to communicate through written or verbal language, however, a young child’s brain is so adaptable that it will reorganise itself and the ability to use language will be retained.” It’s this ongoing ability of the brain to adapt that is the reason why young children require regular exposure to language.
Reading allows your brain to directly download information
“Although the headsets of science fiction are still far off, technology – like the printing press – has been amplifying human abilities and helping us learn, process and communicate for centuries now,” explains Dr. Wingeier. But why does this count as a brain-machine interface? When you learned to read, your brain had to change and restructure itself so your visual and language systems could transfer information from the page into your working memory. “Now, we’re augmenting our brains further with smartphones and Google searches,” he says. “And, just like the science-fiction headsets, it’s up to us to use them wisely.”