3 ms·

Counterexamples include SIDS, stroke, epilepsy, psychosis, and suicidal depression.

• thristian 16y ago
  Ever since I learned about it, I've always thought epilepsy was a astounding example of the brain's ability to recover from cascading system failures. After an episode of epilepsy, not only can the brain resume its ordinary functioning, but it hasn't even rebooted — non-volatile storage (memories and learned skills) is not corrupted, and even higher-level state like personality is unscathed. It's unfair to criticise a system for having a failure-state, because all systems have failure states. Different systems have different ways of handling failure-states, though, and the brain's ability to cope with failures is nigh amazing.
  • goodside 16y ago
    Just to be pedantic, non-volatile storage is what survives a reboot on a computer. For the brain to have "not even rebooted" you'd have to come out of the seizure with your short-term working memory intact. I'm not an expert, but I strongly suspect it's not possible to start dialing a phone number, enter a petit mal seizure for five seconds, and then finish dialing without having lost your place.
    • ahoyhere 16y ago
      I can't weigh in on your statement with any factual additions but... If you start dialing a number, and somebody calls your name and you turn around and talk to them for 10 seconds, you probably can't resume where you left off, either. :)
• pygy_ 16y ago
  And death. Biological systems do crash, all the time.