Epicenter of brain's predictive ability pinpointed by scientists

[INTP]

Interesting

In recent years, sciblessenblesstists have disblesscovblessered the human brain works on preblessdicblesstions, conblesstrary to the preblessviblessously accepted theory that it reacts to the senblesssablesstions it picks up from the outblessside world. Experts say humans' reacblesstions are in fact the body adjusting to preblessdicblesstions the brain is making based on the state of our body the last time it was in a simblessilar situation.

Now, Uniblessverblesssity Disblesstinblessguished Problessfessor Lisa Feldman Barblessrett at Northblesseastern has reported finding the epiblesscenter of those predictions.

In an article pubblesslished in Nature last week, Barblessrett conblesstends that limbic tissue, which also helps to create emoblesstions, is at the top of the brain's preblessdicblesstion hierblessarchy. She co-authored the paper with W. Kyle Simblessmons, of the Laublessreate Instiblesstute for Brain Research in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

"The unique conblesstriblessbublesstion of our paper is to show that limbic tissue, because of its strucblessture and the way the neublessrons are orgablessnized, is preblessdicting," Barblessrett said. "It is directing the preblessdicblesstions to everyblesswhere else in the cortex, and that makes it very powerful."

For example, when a person is instructed to imagine a red apple in his or her mind's eye, Barblessrett explained that limbic parts of the brain send preblessdicblesstions to visual neublessrons and cause them to fire in difblessferent patblessterns so the person can "see" a red apple.

Barblessrett is a facblessulty member in the Departblessment of Psyblesschology and is director of the Interblessdisblessciblesspliblessnary Affecblesstive Sciblessence Labblessoblessrablesstory. A pioblessneer in the psyblesschology of emoblesstion and affecblesstive neublessroblessscience, she has chalblesslenged the founblessdablesstion of affecblesstive sciblessence by showing that people are the archiblesstects of their own emoblesstional experiences.

In the Nature paper, Barblessrett sumblessmablessrized research on the celblesslular comblesspoblesssiblesstion of limbic tissue, which shows that limbic regions of the brain send but do not receive preblessdicblesstions. This means that limbic regions direct problesscessing in the brain. They don't react to stimblessublesslablesstion from the outblessside world. This is ironic, Barblessrett argues, because when sciblessenblesstists used to believe that limbic regions of the brain were the home of emoblesstion, they were seen as mainly reacblesstive to the world.

Common sense tells you that seeing is believing, but really the brain is built for things to work the other way around: you see (and hear and smell and taste) what you believe. And believing is largely based on feeling. In her paper, Barblessrett shows that your brain is not wired to be a reacblesstive organ. It's wired to ask the quesblesstion: "The last time I was in a sitblessublessablesstion like this, what senblesssablesstions did I encounter, and how did I act?" And the senblesssablesstions that seem to matter most are the ones that are inside your own body, which are called "interoceptions."

"What your brain is trying to do is guess what the senblesssablesstion means and what's causing the senblesssablesstions so it can figure out what to do about them," Barblessrett said. "Your brain is trying to put together thoughts, feelblessings, and perblesscepblesstions so they arrive as needed, not a second afterwards."

Edit. dunno why, but the forum keeps altering the text after posting so that its full of weird typos that werent written there

 

[Kas]

Good, for the moment I thought that this is advance English which I don’t understand. The word “bless” is everywhere. Should we exorcize forum?

I think that the article it is a simplification. The way we see the world is resultant of sensations and predictions. We can't function normally without any of it. Without limbic system we lose an ability to adapt and memory (mostly ability of learning new things and having new memories), so it’s like being the guy from “Memento”. Without sensory information we can’t recognize things for example after temporal cortex damage one may not recognize words and not understand speech, after occipital lobes damage one may not recognize things he sees.

True is that without limbic system and frontal lobes our reactions would be simple reflexes and not individual reactions.

 

[spirilis]

The point I get out of the article is that the consciousness works not so much by continuous import of sensory data and automatic assimilation of it, but by spontaneously producing predictive expectations of those sensory inputs and then when the real sensory inputs come through, compared and reacted upon in kind.

So the question then becomes, how do we learn - if the statement I made is correct up above, how are those predictions altered? It's telling that the limbic system is also reportedly the seat of memory, so clearly it has its datastore present locally at its fingertips.