One possibility is that the mode and requirements of life have changed so quickly over the last few thousand years that the brain's ability to rewire and optimi

One possibility is that the mode and requirements of life have changed so quickly over the last few thousand years that the brain's ability to rewire and optimize for changed environment is lagging, and disabling large swathes of it acts as a kind of a shock therapy to rewire the rest of it at fast pace. The implication is that finding a way to gradually disable parts of the brain may force similar rewiring of active parts; at this point the latent part may be re-enabled and may 'learn' from the rewired part. I would volunteer but, uh..