8 ms·

Practical Facts about the Human Brain

396 points by LeonW 8y ago

marmaduke 8y ago
I upvoted because I like to see popularizations of results from neuroscience, but I would also caution against cherry picking papers and placing interpretations atop them.
- zahreeley 8y ago
  Same here.
- simmanian 8y ago
  > caution against cherry picking papers and placing interpretations atop them I worry about this every time I read a "practical" article about the brain. Can anyone tell if the main points in this article is generally accepted in the scientific community?
  - mattdeboard 8y ago
    The "active amygdala = no empathy" point does not jibe with my lay understanding of the physical phenomenon of empathy. That's the only one that I don't believe models our physiology in a useful way. The rest match up with some of the stuff I've read/watched. Watch some videos by Robert Sapolsky on YouTube. He's a neurostuff prof at Stanford. Good presentations. There's "Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM Also an actual academic lecture on the Limbic System which contextualizes & clarifies some of the other assertions in the OP blog post. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAOnSbDSaOw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAOnSbDSaOw There are more but hopefully YouTube's algorithm helps you out there. The Stanford lecture series is very interesting though Sapolsky doesn't deliver all the lectures. edit: The only plausible, good faith explanation of the amygdala-empathy claim I can think of is that there are facial recognition studies designed to activate the amygdala https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4979579/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4979579/ that showed some correlation between anxiety levels and ACC-amygdala connectivity. The ACC, or anterior cingulate cortex, is held to be responsible for empathy. So it may be an interpretation of that knowledge the author is talking about. I know that facial recognition tests are used for evaluation of empathy, sexual attraction and so on. This is probably the kernel of accuracy in the claim. Or there may be other science on the topic that reaches a conclusion closer to what the author said. The linked study is extremely interesting read.
  - ggggtez 8y ago
    I'd save yourself the trouble and throw it all in the garbage. >Feeling heart-broken? Feeling angry and frustrated? Feeling sunken and collapsed? Feeling energized and happy? All of these feelings will have had their origin as sensations from vagus nerve. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of everything to do with neurology. There is simply no way to write a point by point rebuttal of how much is wrong in this article.
    - marmaduke 8y ago
      Wow.. I had read through diagonally and missed this one, otherwise I would’ve been a bit more negative. The real shame is that reading about the different systems that do give rise to these feelings is actually really interesting.
- yura 8y ago
  Yes, take for instance: "2.) When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" Leo provides no source for it, and most importantly it sounds like an overly simple model ("your amygdala takes over, and you can't feel any empathy until it's no longer active"), and overly simple models tend to be very wrong when we're trying to describe such complex mechanisms as that of our brains. Taking research papers and drawing conclusions and interpretations without formal training, in an authoritative manner, can lead to a lot of inaccurate beliefs about the world that people might carry to their grave because they think they're backed by science.
  - ggggtez 8y ago
    Also... >When a synapse strengthens, its neighbors weaken Again, author draws nonsense conclusions based on this about skill learning. A synapse is not a skill.
saagarjha 8y ago
> Feeling heart-broken? Feeling angry and frustrated? Feeling sunken and collapsed? Feeling energized and happy? All of these feelings will have had their origin as sensations from vagus nerve. I thought emotions can from the limbic system?
- eli_gottlieb 8y ago
  Emotions come from the entire body, as interpreted by the insular cortex (internal sensation) and cingulate cortex (internal motor planning). I'd have to check the source, but I'm pretty damn skeptical on all interoceptive information flowing through the vagus nerve. I'm pretty sure my adviser has told me that's Just Plain Wrong.
sidcool 8y ago
Haven't read it completely, but hoping it has something related to guts' connection with brain
Isamu 8y ago
I wish people would be more skeptical about their recall of memories. In particular I wish people would stop thinking their memories are especially accurate if they were especially "vivid". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashbulb_memory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashbulb_memory
- DanielFlower 8y ago
  I agree. Memory biases may either enhance or impair the recall of memory, or they may alter the content of what we report remembering. There are many memory biases including the humor effect, positivity effect and the generation effect. The humor effect states that humorous items are more easily remembered than non-humorous ones. Positivity effects states that older adults favor positive over negative information in their memories. Generation effect states that self-generated information is remembered best.
  - zdragnar 8y ago
    How universal are these biases? Anecdotally, I feel as though i have a stronger recall of negative experiences than equivalently good ones. If that is a thing, i wonder if it might be due to, or perhaps a cause of, depression.
    - lr4444lr 8y ago
      I think the better question to ask is, what kind of memory? Research I cannot conveniently find at the moment shows that raw declarative memory is improved under trauma. For example, most people who were old enough, nationwide, can recall where they were and what they were doing on 9/11. Other kinds of memory, like skill automating (e.g. playing the chords effortlessly on a guitar or mastering the core grammar of a language) are much harder to do when you're under stress.
      - AndreasM 8y ago
        Interestingly, though, it often turns out that recalling "where they were and what they were doing on 9/11" is very often wrong. And that when you're wrong, you're more certain you're right. Malcolm Gladwell did a very interesting podcast episode on that: http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/24-free-brian-williams http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/24-free-brian-william...
pknight 8y ago
Would have been better form to more substantially attribute Stephen Porges' work here, only a small mention is placed under his chart.
- LeonW 8y ago
  Great point, I feel incredibly indebted to Stephen Porges', both for my own internal well-being and the lessons I've learned and can share with others.
8ytecoder 8y ago
“What is my body trying to tell me with that tight stomach, sunken heart, clenched shoulders?” I have been reading Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach and this is one of the themes that keeps repeating in that book and in general in meditation. To understand one's mind and the root cause of an emotion one need to focus the attention on how one's body feels and what it's trying to say. While meditation is now widely accepted as beneficial, I have generally been less accepting or even dismissive of the surrounding teachings and method. I think it's time to revisit my views and be more open to it.
- LeonW 8y ago
  Yes, I'm a big fan of Tara Brach's work too! My experience has been that many of us live in such a cognitively focused world that the sensations and feelings of our bodies take a huge back-seat.
- tcmb 8y ago
  On Amazon, I'm seeing 'Radical Acceptance: Awakening the Love that Heals Fear and Shame' from 2003 and 'Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha' from 2004. Is the newer edition much different, apart from a presumably more fashionable subtitle?
- radicaldreamer 8y ago
  I’ve had a similar experience. I think the reason is that there’s a lot of noise in the field. A ton of low quality thought and half baked ideas or pure nonsense. But that really should not close one off to reputable sources like Tara Brach (highly recommend people start with her guided sessions which are available free on her site) who have a well of experience honed over the years. One time in India, some family members took me to an astrologer. I was extremely skeptical but this person was famous in town and well known regionally as well. And when I voiced my concerns that the whole field was all hocus pocus, one of my relatives said that may well be true for many individual practitioners in the field, but if you think about it as a person communicating to you using their own finely tuned heuristic for outcomes, it’s a different story. Maybe the more reputable sources in these fields should be thought of in that way, where you shouldn’t expect perfect accuracy but you should use their thoughts and knowledge as a rough guide to a kind of knowledge we have very few tools to directly explore rather than pure truths.
happy-go-lucky 8y ago
> I went to live in buddhist monasteries for a few years. There I was able to turn my focus away from outside of myself towards my own body, feelings and inner world. That's from their Main Story. I'm trying to tell myself that I can think effectively as long as I'm in focus.
LeonW 8y ago
Hi everyone, Leo here. I feel grateful for the HN community's response to this post. I only emerged recently to the "real world" again and feel still some hesitation and fear around showing a much more vulnerable part of myself with the work I do now. (Building marketing software was fun too!) So yeah, just want to say thanks and would love to discuss anything this sparks.
- adv0r 8y ago
  Hi LeonW, I was born in Bozen, I use your software, and I practice meditation every day. I work at a startup where we try to keep stress low in a friendly environment. Wanted to say thanks, nice article, and you are very brave to open up that way ;)
  - LeonW 8y ago
    Thanks man! Feel the love over here in the woods. If I can support you or your company with anything, please reach out! (l.widrich@gmail.com)
- joe_the_user 8y ago
  1) "80% of your body’s signals are sent to the brain from the body and only 20% the other way around." This is pretty interesting. The idea of not attempt to "command" the body but work with the body and unconscious process is common in a wide variety of martial arts and healing art modalities (Alexander Technique, Qigong, hypnosis, etc). 2) "When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" Unfortunately, this statement seems to suffer from the weakness of popular psychology expositions - a series of fairly pat cause-and-effect statement when the causes of virtually all behavior is more complex and much less certain. The human brain is fantastically complex thing. Neurologists and psychologists have done many experiments on it. The "replication crisis" is a good indicator how difficult is to go from experiments on a few particulars to a general understanding of how the brain works. I think the criticism of "functional areas" that Luria made in The Working Brain should be read carefully. The thing about this is: neurological research is great to add if what you're looking for is "what might be", using methods that possibly have scientific and seem effective. But if you operate in terms of "how things absolutely are", then one risks going into the realm of pseudo-science. And there's a lot of supposedly neurologically based new age quackery out there - much of it based things that "the latest findings" whenever said quack happened to get their start.
mettamage 8y ago
My simplified main takeaway from this post is: chronic stress seems to be at least as bad as chronic alcoholism [1] and therefore we really really need to be masters at the art of relaxation. The two forms of evidence that stood out to me: (1) the effect of an overactive amygdala and (2) the negative effect of stress on the neocortex. [1] Alcoholism isn’t mentioned in the post, that’s my own interpretation of the potential damage it can go. I’m going to do an online search for it to see whether that comparison has any merit.
- quickthrower2 8y ago
  I am also a believer in getting out of crappy situations, for example a bad job. Sure you can meditate to calm yourself down every day, but sometimes the situation needs to change.
- ggggtez 8y ago
  I'd caution against taking anything in this article as truth. This is written by a self help guru, not a neurologist.
  - mettamage 8y ago
    I know, fortunately I know enough neuroscience to know to what extent I should believe this.
soared 8y ago
> 2.) When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others I'm curious is this is a mechanism behind social anxiety. In some social situations I very clearly lose the ability to think - all thats left is an empty mind and my body going through the motions. Its completely different than my regular way of living (from my perspective, maybe not from other people's perspective) but definitely makes it more difficult to connect with others and build friendships.
dschuetz 8y ago
So, 2. + 5. + 6. might be the sources of bipolar disorders? Brain chemistry out of balance means that activation patterns are being modulated differently than before, and stress causes that in one way or another. Changed modulation might trigger changing/cycling states of peace or alertness, shrinking or widening associative activation. But why are some people more susceptible to stress than others? What is different?
- ggggtez 8y ago
  Bipolar is not related to stress disorders. Please don't try to use this article as a primary source, because it misinterprets everything and tries to put a "self-help" spin on it, which is just going to confuse you more.
  - dschuetz 8y ago
    Why are you patronizing? And what are "stress disorders"?
gloriousduke 8y ago
"When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" This is an excellent example of those aspects of our existence that are deterministic. No matter your willpower, you may be bound by biology to act a certain way. Part of being a good person is to recognize these deterministic effects and plan your life accordingly. For example, if you get "hangry" often, keep a food item on hand at all times so that you can address your hunger before you say something mean to your partner et al.
- agumonkey 8y ago
  bound may be too strict, plasticity allows for reshaping your emotions, senses, how you process them
  - gloriousduke 8y ago
    I suppose that falls under "Part of being a good person is to recognize these deterministic effects and plan your life accordingly." The type of "reshaping" you're referring to would go beyond willpower in a single moment. Probably something like cognitive behavioral therapy?
    - agumonkey 8y ago
      Yeah CBT is in that box and it's indeed not a oneshot effort more like a year-scale (if not decade) process. The ideas aren't that complex, but like music .. it's subtle and requires life experience.
SteveParker60 8y ago
pop-ups!
dahart 8y ago
> When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others Do being late for something and driving in traffic activate the amygdala? I think I can feel that combination drain my empathy. I'm trying to actively avoid those two things. Anecdotally, it sure seems to have a similar effect on quite a few others too.
TeMPOraL 8y ago
I wonder how it is determined which neurons send signals "to" vs. "from" brain. This 80/20 to/from split is surprising. The reason I'm asking is because sending electrons up a wire isn't the only way to signal with electricity. When the output that was high-impedance suddenly opens up, allowing you to send electricity through, that actually can be a signal to you, that something on the other end has changed.
- skohan 8y ago
  Neurons can be understood to be fairly directional. There is no direct electrical connection between neurons: there's actually a small gap between the upstream neuron and the downstream neuron. When the electrical signal reaches this gap, the up-stream neuron releases a chemical signal, which is processed by the down-stream. So the state of the up-stream neuron depends very little on the down-stream neuron: if the down-stream neuron is in it's refractory period and can't process the chemical signal, the up-stream neuron can still fire all day, and the chemicals it releases will essentially fall on deaf ears. That is a somewhat simplified view, and there is such a thing as retrograde signaling (chemical messaging from the post-synaptic neuron to the pre-synaptic neuron), but it's believed these signals have less to do with the primary flow of information in the brain, and probably relate to slower processes like modifying the strength of the chemical signal in the affected synapse.

396 points by LeonW 8y ago

I upvoted because I like to see popularizations of results from neuroscience, but I would also caution against cherry picking papers and placing interpretations atop them.

zahreeley 8y ago
Same here.
simmanian 8y ago
> caution against cherry picking papers and placing interpretations atop them I worry about this every time I read a "practical" article about the brain. Can anyone tell if the main points in this article is generally accepted in the scientific community?
- mattdeboard 8y ago
  The "active amygdala = no empathy" point does not jibe with my lay understanding of the physical phenomenon of empathy. That's the only one that I don't believe models our physiology in a useful way. The rest match up with some of the stuff I've read/watched. Watch some videos by Robert Sapolsky on YouTube. He's a neurostuff prof at Stanford. Good presentations. There's "Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM Also an actual academic lecture on the Limbic System which contextualizes & clarifies some of the other assertions in the OP blog post. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAOnSbDSaOw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAOnSbDSaOw There are more but hopefully YouTube's algorithm helps you out there. The Stanford lecture series is very interesting though Sapolsky doesn't deliver all the lectures. edit: The only plausible, good faith explanation of the amygdala-empathy claim I can think of is that there are facial recognition studies designed to activate the amygdala https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4979579/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4979579/ that showed some correlation between anxiety levels and ACC-amygdala connectivity. The ACC, or anterior cingulate cortex, is held to be responsible for empathy. So it may be an interpretation of that knowledge the author is talking about. I know that facial recognition tests are used for evaluation of empathy, sexual attraction and so on. This is probably the kernel of accuracy in the claim. Or there may be other science on the topic that reaches a conclusion closer to what the author said. The linked study is extremely interesting read.
- ggggtez 8y ago
  I'd save yourself the trouble and throw it all in the garbage. >Feeling heart-broken? Feeling angry and frustrated? Feeling sunken and collapsed? Feeling energized and happy? All of these feelings will have had their origin as sensations from vagus nerve. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of everything to do with neurology. There is simply no way to write a point by point rebuttal of how much is wrong in this article.
  - marmaduke 8y ago
    Wow.. I had read through diagonally and missed this one, otherwise I would’ve been a bit more negative. The real shame is that reading about the different systems that do give rise to these feelings is actually really interesting.
yura 8y ago
Yes, take for instance: "2.) When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" Leo provides no source for it, and most importantly it sounds like an overly simple model ("your amygdala takes over, and you can't feel any empathy until it's no longer active"), and overly simple models tend to be very wrong when we're trying to describe such complex mechanisms as that of our brains. Taking research papers and drawing conclusions and interpretations without formal training, in an authoritative manner, can lead to a lot of inaccurate beliefs about the world that people might carry to their grave because they think they're backed by science.
- ggggtez 8y ago
  Also... >When a synapse strengthens, its neighbors weaken Again, author draws nonsense conclusions based on this about skill learning. A synapse is not a skill.

saagarjha 8y ago

> Feeling heart-broken? Feeling angry and frustrated? Feeling sunken and collapsed? Feeling energized and happy? All of these feelings will have had their origin as sensations from vagus nerve. I thought emotions can from the limbic system?

eli_gottlieb 8y ago
Emotions come from the entire body, as interpreted by the insular cortex (internal sensation) and cingulate cortex (internal motor planning). I'd have to check the source, but I'm pretty damn skeptical on all interoceptive information flowing through the vagus nerve. I'm pretty sure my adviser has told me that's Just Plain Wrong.

sidcool 8y ago

Haven't read it completely, but hoping it has something related to guts' connection with brain

Isamu 8y ago

I wish people would be more skeptical about their recall of memories. In particular I wish people would stop thinking their memories are especially accurate if they were especially "vivid". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashbulb_memory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashbulb_memory

DanielFlower 8y ago
I agree. Memory biases may either enhance or impair the recall of memory, or they may alter the content of what we report remembering. There are many memory biases including the humor effect, positivity effect and the generation effect. The humor effect states that humorous items are more easily remembered than non-humorous ones. Positivity effects states that older adults favor positive over negative information in their memories. Generation effect states that self-generated information is remembered best.
- zdragnar 8y ago
  How universal are these biases? Anecdotally, I feel as though i have a stronger recall of negative experiences than equivalently good ones. If that is a thing, i wonder if it might be due to, or perhaps a cause of, depression.
  - lr4444lr 8y ago
    I think the better question to ask is, what kind of memory? Research I cannot conveniently find at the moment shows that raw declarative memory is improved under trauma. For example, most people who were old enough, nationwide, can recall where they were and what they were doing on 9/11. Other kinds of memory, like skill automating (e.g. playing the chords effortlessly on a guitar or mastering the core grammar of a language) are much harder to do when you're under stress.
    - AndreasM 8y ago
      Interestingly, though, it often turns out that recalling "where they were and what they were doing on 9/11" is very often wrong. And that when you're wrong, you're more certain you're right. Malcolm Gladwell did a very interesting podcast episode on that: http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/24-free-brian-williams http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/24-free-brian-william...

pknight 8y ago

Would have been better form to more substantially attribute Stephen Porges' work here, only a small mention is placed under his chart.

LeonW 8y ago
Great point, I feel incredibly indebted to Stephen Porges', both for my own internal well-being and the lessons I've learned and can share with others.

8ytecoder 8y ago

“What is my body trying to tell me with that tight stomach, sunken heart, clenched shoulders?” I have been reading Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach and this is one of the themes that keeps repeating in that book and in general in meditation. To understand one's mind and the root cause of an emotion one need to focus the attention on how one's body feels and what it's trying to say. While meditation is now widely accepted as beneficial, I have generally been less accepting or even dismissive of the surrounding teachings and method. I think it's time to revisit my views and be more open to it.

LeonW 8y ago
Yes, I'm a big fan of Tara Brach's work too! My experience has been that many of us live in such a cognitively focused world that the sensations and feelings of our bodies take a huge back-seat.
tcmb 8y ago
On Amazon, I'm seeing 'Radical Acceptance: Awakening the Love that Heals Fear and Shame' from 2003 and 'Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha' from 2004. Is the newer edition much different, apart from a presumably more fashionable subtitle?
radicaldreamer 8y ago
I’ve had a similar experience. I think the reason is that there’s a lot of noise in the field. A ton of low quality thought and half baked ideas or pure nonsense. But that really should not close one off to reputable sources like Tara Brach (highly recommend people start with her guided sessions which are available free on her site) who have a well of experience honed over the years. One time in India, some family members took me to an astrologer. I was extremely skeptical but this person was famous in town and well known regionally as well. And when I voiced my concerns that the whole field was all hocus pocus, one of my relatives said that may well be true for many individual practitioners in the field, but if you think about it as a person communicating to you using their own finely tuned heuristic for outcomes, it’s a different story. Maybe the more reputable sources in these fields should be thought of in that way, where you shouldn’t expect perfect accuracy but you should use their thoughts and knowledge as a rough guide to a kind of knowledge we have very few tools to directly explore rather than pure truths.

happy-go-lucky 8y ago

> I went to live in buddhist monasteries for a few years. There I was able to turn my focus away from outside of myself towards my own body, feelings and inner world. That's from their Main Story. I'm trying to tell myself that I can think effectively as long as I'm in focus.

LeonW 8y ago

Hi everyone, Leo here. I feel grateful for the HN community's response to this post. I only emerged recently to the "real world" again and feel still some hesitation and fear around showing a much more vulnerable part of myself with the work I do now. (Building marketing software was fun too!) So yeah, just want to say thanks and would love to discuss anything this sparks.

adv0r 8y ago
Hi LeonW, I was born in Bozen, I use your software, and I practice meditation every day. I work at a startup where we try to keep stress low in a friendly environment. Wanted to say thanks, nice article, and you are very brave to open up that way ;)
- LeonW 8y ago
  Thanks man! Feel the love over here in the woods. If I can support you or your company with anything, please reach out! (l.widrich@gmail.com)
joe_the_user 8y ago
1) "80% of your body’s signals are sent to the brain from the body and only 20% the other way around." This is pretty interesting. The idea of not attempt to "command" the body but work with the body and unconscious process is common in a wide variety of martial arts and healing art modalities (Alexander Technique, Qigong, hypnosis, etc). 2) "When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" Unfortunately, this statement seems to suffer from the weakness of popular psychology expositions - a series of fairly pat cause-and-effect statement when the causes of virtually all behavior is more complex and much less certain. The human brain is fantastically complex thing. Neurologists and psychologists have done many experiments on it. The "replication crisis" is a good indicator how difficult is to go from experiments on a few particulars to a general understanding of how the brain works. I think the criticism of "functional areas" that Luria made in The Working Brain should be read carefully. The thing about this is: neurological research is great to add if what you're looking for is "what might be", using methods that possibly have scientific and seem effective. But if you operate in terms of "how things absolutely are", then one risks going into the realm of pseudo-science. And there's a lot of supposedly neurologically based new age quackery out there - much of it based things that "the latest findings" whenever said quack happened to get their start.

mettamage 8y ago

My simplified main takeaway from this post is: chronic stress seems to be at least as bad as chronic alcoholism [1] and therefore we really really need to be masters at the art of relaxation. The two forms of evidence that stood out to me: (1) the effect of an overactive amygdala and (2) the negative effect of stress on the neocortex. [1] Alcoholism isn’t mentioned in the post, that’s my own interpretation of the potential damage it can go. I’m going to do an online search for it to see whether that comparison has any merit.

quickthrower2 8y ago
I am also a believer in getting out of crappy situations, for example a bad job. Sure you can meditate to calm yourself down every day, but sometimes the situation needs to change.
ggggtez 8y ago
I'd caution against taking anything in this article as truth. This is written by a self help guru, not a neurologist.
- mettamage 8y ago
  I know, fortunately I know enough neuroscience to know to what extent I should believe this.

soared 8y ago

> 2.) When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others I'm curious is this is a mechanism behind social anxiety. In some social situations I very clearly lose the ability to think - all thats left is an empty mind and my body going through the motions. Its completely different than my regular way of living (from my perspective, maybe not from other people's perspective) but definitely makes it more difficult to connect with others and build friendships.

dschuetz 8y ago

So, 2. + 5. + 6. might be the sources of bipolar disorders? Brain chemistry out of balance means that activation patterns are being modulated differently than before, and stress causes that in one way or another. Changed modulation might trigger changing/cycling states of peace or alertness, shrinking or widening associative activation. But why are some people more susceptible to stress than others? What is different?

ggggtez 8y ago
Bipolar is not related to stress disorders. Please don't try to use this article as a primary source, because it misinterprets everything and tries to put a "self-help" spin on it, which is just going to confuse you more.
- dschuetz 8y ago
  Why are you patronizing? And what are "stress disorders"?

gloriousduke 8y ago

"When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others" This is an excellent example of those aspects of our existence that are deterministic. No matter your willpower, you may be bound by biology to act a certain way. Part of being a good person is to recognize these deterministic effects and plan your life accordingly. For example, if you get "hangry" often, keep a food item on hand at all times so that you can address your hunger before you say something mean to your partner et al.

agumonkey 8y ago
bound may be too strict, plasticity allows for reshaping your emotions, senses, how you process them
- gloriousduke 8y ago
  I suppose that falls under "Part of being a good person is to recognize these deterministic effects and plan your life accordingly." The type of "reshaping" you're referring to would go beyond willpower in a single moment. Probably something like cognitive behavioral therapy?
  - agumonkey 8y ago
    Yeah CBT is in that box and it's indeed not a oneshot effort more like a year-scale (if not decade) process. The ideas aren't that complex, but like music .. it's subtle and requires life experience.

SteveParker60 8y ago

pop-ups!

dahart 8y ago

> When your amygdala is active, you can’t have empathy for others Do being late for something and driving in traffic activate the amygdala? I think I can feel that combination drain my empathy. I'm trying to actively avoid those two things. Anecdotally, it sure seems to have a similar effect on quite a few others too.

TeMPOraL 8y ago

I wonder how it is determined which neurons send signals "to" vs. "from" brain. This 80/20 to/from split is surprising. The reason I'm asking is because sending electrons up a wire isn't the only way to signal with electricity. When the output that was high-impedance suddenly opens up, allowing you to send electricity through, that actually can be a signal to you, that something on the other end has changed.

skohan 8y ago
Neurons can be understood to be fairly directional. There is no direct electrical connection between neurons: there's actually a small gap between the upstream neuron and the downstream neuron. When the electrical signal reaches this gap, the up-stream neuron releases a chemical signal, which is processed by the down-stream. So the state of the up-stream neuron depends very little on the down-stream neuron: if the down-stream neuron is in it's refractory period and can't process the chemical signal, the up-stream neuron can still fire all day, and the chemicals it releases will essentially fall on deaf ears. That is a somewhat simplified view, and there is such a thing as retrograde signaling (chemical messaging from the post-synaptic neuron to the pre-synaptic neuron), but it's believed these signals have less to do with the primary flow of information in the brain, and probably relate to slower processes like modifying the strength of the chemical signal in the affected synapse.