Narcolepsy.

Narcolepsy is a dieses in which the victim is affected by suddenly falling asleep at any time of the day as many times as the brain orders. This disease is very dangerous because the person can be walking in the street, cooking, driving or doing anything else that might cause a sudden death due to the brain responding to their tiredness. On the video that we watched in class we saw how an elderly man named Mohamed suffered this sickness. He tries to live as normal as he can but he knows its nearly impossible, his wife needs to be with him at all times taking care of him and picking him up whenever he falls asleep. We were able to see how Mohamed fell asleep suddenly in the street. Mohamed and his wife need to live with the constant humiliation of him falling asleep in public places and people misunderstanding him and believing he is a drug addict or an alcoholic. During his daily routing Mohamed need to wear a special security hat to protect himself from getting hurt all around to house especially when he is helping his wife in the kitchen washing the dishes or something else. Having this peculiar dieses must be very uncomfortable and annoying

Goodnight & Sweet Dreams.

Why do we dream? This question has been a constant one for scientists for a long time now. Most scientists explain dreaming as our way of organizing the information we have gathered throughout our day.While we are asleep, our brain can swift through different stages of sleep. There are five different stages that we go through in order to fall asleep. The first stage can be considered as the transition period between wakefulness and sleep, and your brain produces theta waves. In the second stage, the brain starts producing rapid, rhythmic brain wave activity, our body temperature starts to decrease and heart rate begins to slow down. Stage 3 is said to be the transitional period between light sleep and a very deep sleep and our brain produces slow brain waves know as delta waves. Stage 4 is considered the deep sleep stage. Stage 5 is also know as Rapid Eye Movement (REM), in which your respiration rate and brain activity increases. Muscles become more relaxed and heavy dreaming occurs during this stage.During REM sleep, your body becomes paralyzed to avoid you from getting up and acting out your dreams. These are some people who have a disorder in which they get up and act their dreams, which is dangerous for themselves and others around.Scientists carried out an experiment and found out that deep sleep produces positive dreams whereas REM sleep produces negative dreams. About 75% of our dreams are negative and our parietal lobe is responsible four our dreaming. They say that dreams help us solve problems and survive, but there is not an exact and proved reason on why we dream.

Sensory Depravation... yikees!

Eyes and ears covered and unable to move or complete darkness and isolation to the point that you go... crazy? sucks right, well thats what six people thought at least. Six people volunteered to take a test, where they completely isolated them. 48 hours they had to undergo with no brain stimulation at all. it must have been the hardest 48 hours of their lives. some got so bored they started pacing back and forth for complete hours. others started signing as a way to entertain themselves, and one... well she fell asleep throughout the whole experiment (personally thats what I would do). Sensory deprivation affects your senses and the way your whole body acts. It makes you go week and crazy to the point where you think.. am i still alive? Sensory Depravation is used as a method of torture during wars. The United States has one of this "facilities" in Guantanamo Bay, located in Cuba. War prisoners and ect are delivered there to take information out of them. People who have gotten out of there have been left scared for life. Simple things they could do before, are now unavailable to them. The memory is enough torture to last a life time.

Synesthesia

1. synesthesia- condition of brain where stimilation of a sense causes automatic stimulation of another sense.

2. Grapheme color synesthesia- letters or numbers appear in color.

3. Ordinal linguistic personification- numbers, days of the week and month of the year take on persoalities.

4. Number form synesthesia- numbers, dys of the week and or months of the year are seen in precise locations in space.

5. Sound color synesthesia- words cause specific taste sensations in the mouth.

6. Lexical gustatory synesthesia-  One of the rarer forms of synesthesia, in which spoken or written words evoke vivid sensations of taste, sometimes including temperature and texture.

 

Mental Abilities: Genius, Savant and Autism

1.      Explain what "savant syndrome" means.

Savant syndrome: a rare condition in which people with developmental disorders have one or more areas of expertise, ability, or brilliance that are in contrast with the individual's overall limitations.

2. What does genius mean?  Explain the difference between genius and savant.

Genius: A person of extraordinary intellect and talent.

The difference between a savant and a genius is that a savant is born with it and a genius is not. A genius person is someone embodying exceptional intellectual ability while a savant is someone who has difficulties in learning, thought becomes talented in a specific are such mathematics, music, science

3. What is a stroke and how could it affect your mental functioning?

A stoke is the rapidly developing loss of brain function(s) due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can lead to death or affecting a part of the brain and not making it function. It can lead to inability to move, understand language, or inability in the vision are.

4. What is a functional MRI and how does it help us understand brain activity?

It measures the hemodynamic response (change in blood flow) related toneural activity in the brain or spinal cord of humans or other animals. It is one of the most recently developed forms of neuroimaging.

5. What is the corpus callosum and what role does it play in your brain's activity?

Is a wide, flat bundle of neural fibers beneath the cortex in the eutherian brain at the longitudinal fissure. It connects the left and right cerebral hemispheres and facilitates interhemispheric communication.

6. What is epilepsy and how might it affect your brain's abilities?

Is a common chronic neurological disorder characterized by seizures. This makes people have difficulties their whole life.

7. What is autism?

Autism causes kids to experience the world differently from the way most other kids do. It's hard for kids with autism to talk with other people and express themselves using words. Kids who have autism usually keep to themselves and many can't communicate without special help.

8. What is Asperger's Syndrome?

Is a neurobiological disorder that is part of a group of conditions calledautism spectrum disorders. The term "autism spectrum" refers to a range of developmental disabilities that includes autism as well as other disorders with similar characteristics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savant_syndrome

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/genius

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroke

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_magnetic_resonance_imaging

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corpus_callosum

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epilepsy#Causes

http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/brain/asperger.html

Me a Genius? HAHAHA

Ever heard of something called accidental genius? Savants would be the more technical term. Savants are people with developmental disorders and usually have one or more areas in which they can be considered “genius”. Over half of the savant population have autistic disorder, and the other half having developmental disability, such as brain injury and diseases. In most savants the left hemisphere of the brain is more active than the right hemisphere. The left hemisphere is the area of the brain that focuses on the arts and functions by rational thinking. In the video, we met savants who can memorize every single book they’ve read, others who are excellent artists, and others who can tell you the date of any given date—all with no prior learning to do what they do. Scientists have concluded that the left hemisphere of savants are strongly more dominant than ones of an average person. once the left side is more active, it does what it does best. Scientists are now constructing the “thinking cap” in which it temporarly distorts the right side of your brain to allow the left side to unravel your hidden talents. Being a savant is such a rare disorder that there are as little as 100 savants in the whole world.

Make me a GENIUS.

Genius.. it can be something you are naturally gifted with, or you may acquire  it. how? easy: PRACTICE. if you have an early stimulation everything is made so much easier for you. need proof, i'll give you proof: Susan Polgar. Susan when young found pieces of chess and since then it was instant chemistry. Her father seeing her fascination about it made her read and memorize thousands of book about the strategies in chess, and having her PRACTICE against the best chess players. All of his efforts were not in vain, as Polgar quickly rose to victory as the best, and proving that women were not mentally inferior compared to men as many believe. Susan Polgar molded herself into chess, making her a genius at her. She can win a match in 60 seconds and order a whole chess set in 3. Susan Polgar is now following her father's footsteps in the future of her young son.

Genius.

Can you imagine how there are many little children all over the world who are born genius and have the ability to do things that aren’t known for people in that age to do? Well there is and it took me quite some convincing to say so. When stimulations is developed at an early age, a higher IQ can be achieved later in life. A little kid names Mark is a perfect example. He is about five or six years old and at that early age, he is a PRO at piano. Once he hears a musical note, he can identify, just like mozart did. 40 classical music pieces are stored in his memory. a theory is that if you practice music throughout the day at an early age, your brain can develop certain parts a lot more than it would without. A case which is the polar opposite from mark is about a 12 year old who was locked all her life by her mentally unstable father. He claimed that he wanted to hide his daughter from the world, but when he did so, he left her without any mental stimulation. She is now a 12 year old with the mind of an 18month old. she cant speak and because of the lack of stimulation she lost all ability to do so properly. She was later abused at foster homes until the day of her death came.

Nature Vs. Nurture [HOMOSEXUALITY]

I love him <3

homosexuals are all around us, Out in the open, and some hiding behind a mask. one of the most confusing topics that the world has met is whether a homosexual became that way OR was born that way. There are two sides to any story an din this case its Nature vs Nurture. Nature mean that they were born that way and Nurture means that they were influenced by their envioronment. Reaserch has yet to find a solid answer but we have had some updates on a possible theory. The more sons the mother has, the more likely that one of them will be gay. Each time a woman has a sonher body confuses the baby for and intrusion of some kind, creating antibodies. The more son, the more antibodies are created meaning less testosterone levels are created. after each son the next one has 1/3 more of a chance to become gay than his siblings. Another way people may become homosexual is by abuse. when young many women may be abused by men, making them fear them and lean towards the more femine side. The same may happen to men. In the end we will never know if homosexuals is a Nature or Nurture case.

I Want to be Made into a Criminal (not literally)

Have you ever thought why would someone deliberatly kill another person? why would someone commit such an atrocious act? Criminal are not born, they are made. There are many ways a person can become a criminal. First maybe the frontal lovbe of the brain may be damaged. The frontal lobe controls rational thoughts and emotions. if the criminal's rational though is cutt off, then it makes it hard for the offender to think logically of what he/she is doing, or what he/she has done. If the emotions are messed up then the offender could not handle anger, or stress well leading him/she to commit something that they would never do. its has been proven that most criminals were abused when younger. it might have been at home or school (but the most logical is at home). When being inspected many crimnial have old scars, due to the beatings they recived at home, making them bitter and angry when older. Brain damage takes a part in a criminals mind, because ususally a criminals brain is or has been damaged in the past. A criminal isnt born, everyone is the same at the moment of birth, but what changed a person is their upbrining and how they live their life.

Brain Injuries.

Brain damage may be caused whenever a person has an accident involving the head. it may be of any kind as long as it is strong (car accident, falling to hard, being hit in the head, ect). A strong hit causes the brain to move inside the skull, making crash against the skull walls damaging it. there are three kinds of damages that the brain mat suffer :moderate, mild, and severe. A moderate brain damage is the least harmsful and the easiest to recover from, due to the fact that the hit wasnt as stong. Mild brain damage takes longer to heal but nevertheless it is an imidiate warning to our system that wehave to takeb etter care. Last but no Least we have the severe brain damage. This as you might have guesses is te worst kind of brain injury.People who suffer severe brain damages have a very unlikely chance of ever recovering from the trauma. Brain damage can change a person life depending on what category theyre in. People who have suffered brain damage can now have thedifficulty of walking, talking, and doing other simple task. Sever Traumas usually leave the subjet in a hospital because they no longer have the ability to help themselves.

Mind Reading

Have you ever played that game where in your mind you say "cough if you can hear this"? or ever thought if someone could hear your thoughts? We see it in Books, T.v and Movies all the time examples such as Heroes, Edward from the twilight series, Vladimir tod in the Vladimir tod chronicles. We always thought that mind reading was never possible, but what if it is? Modern scientist have discovered a way to read your mind using advanced technology. The MRI machines is desing to research how the brain works. it can analyze images, math problems, words, an does much more. When a person is put throught his test, the machine scan their brain for activity, giving a clear picture on what the person could be thinking by showing us which parts of the brain is in use while a thought happened. it can tell us if the person if thinking about an image or maybe a secrete. This machine has been used many times by doctor as to analyze what could be wrong when a person is having trouble with their brain. Thanks to the MRI machine, court trials have been determined. People who claimed they were innocent were really found guilty and thrown into jail. technology is more advanced each day and this machine (MRI) is just another step in the staricase to succes ;) The MRI machine has given un an insight on what we never thought possible.

Inside The Teenage Brain

Change is constant during our teenage years. This is confusing for the parents as well as the teenagers themselves. things like relationships, sleeping habits and mood. Teenagers feel like they can handle everything themselves, when we actually need help but are too proud to ask for it. Teenagers sleep for over hours and still feel tired. one minute they can be hyper, the next depressed and for last they can be grumpy? why does all of this happen? Well during the teenage our brain is constantly changing. Out frontal lobe is growing and changing, and it is this part of the brain that deals with emotions hence the whole mood swings. Parents and their teenagers fight quite often because of the simplest of things and that is because us as teenagers feel like theyre over protective, they control us way to much and do let us be. while that might be the case our parents are only trying to help us and do the best for us considering they already went through that stage. I personally feel like i always need my mother, but when she tries to reach out the first thing I want to do is back away. Sleep is an important factor for teenagers because if we keep a healthy sleeping habit we can do so much good and school and in our personal lives, if not we fail and school and suffer sleep depravation. The teenage years might be the hardest but certainly the most fun ones.