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But isn't the brain massively multitasking? It controls and keeps track of an awful lot of stuff. The "can't do multiple things [well] at once" really just appl

But isn't the brain massively multitasking? It controls and keeps track of an awful lot of stuff. The "can't do multiple things [well] at once" really just applies to conscious efforts.

Filligree 7y ago
It is, but that's not what the article is about.
alexanderdmitri 7y ago
Maybe he meant the conscious mind we experience abstractly and is somehow hosted in / by the brain. In which case, sure, it makes sense that each thought blocks the main thread and that's why thought-loops are particularly annoying. In terms of I/O though, I certainly try to optimize the main thread with concurrent patterns when the input queue gets hit with high traffic. Even if I'm recurrently mulling over something for days, hoping for a break-through or insight or whatever, it's not like I'm incapacitated and can't perform / prioritize other thoughtful tasks on the event loop.
nvrspyx 7y ago
The keyword in the previous person's comment is attention. It's attention that is incapable of multi-tasking. It really just bounces from one thing to the other and attention is sort of what drives consciousness and directs it where to go. But the rest of the brain is doing a ton, such as memory encoding to both working and long-term memory. It's also doing things like language, motor, emotional processing, etc. as well as all the things more peripheral to consciousness like senses, time, vitals, etc. If we look at the brain like a computer that interacts with the world as well as interacted with, I like to imagine that the brain is very complex and running many parallel processes. Like a computer, it has many parts of the interface to the world. Eyes are the screen, ears are the speakers, muscles are the mouse and keyboard, etc. I like to think of attention as the cursor; sort of a single process that directs what the user is interacting with. I'm positive that is much too simple of an analogy because it still leaves the question: why can't consciousness control multiple attention cursors simultaneously? In many ways, it does in which consciousness can pass things off to automatic processing, like triggering muscle memory and other previously strengthened pathways. But, I think the why there's not multiple attention processes running is still a big question yet to be answered. I think neuroscience still has a lot to be understood before we'll be able to answer it sufficiently.

But isn't the brain massively multitasking? It controls and keeps track of an awful lot of stuff. The "can't do multiple things [well] at once" really just applies to conscious efforts.

Filligree 7y ago

It is, but that's not what the article is about.

alexanderdmitri 7y ago

Maybe he meant the conscious mind we experience abstractly and is somehow hosted in / by the brain. In which case, sure, it makes sense that each thought blocks the main thread and that's why thought-loops are particularly annoying. In terms of I/O though, I certainly try to optimize the main thread with concurrent patterns when the input queue gets hit with high traffic. Even if I'm recurrently mulling over something for days, hoping for a break-through or insight or whatever, it's not like I'm incapacitated and can't perform / prioritize other thoughtful tasks on the event loop.

nvrspyx 7y ago

The keyword in the previous person's comment is attention. It's attention that is incapable of multi-tasking. It really just bounces from one thing to the other and attention is sort of what drives consciousness and directs it where to go. But the rest of the brain is doing a ton, such as memory encoding to both working and long-term memory. It's also doing things like language, motor, emotional processing, etc. as well as all the things more peripheral to consciousness like senses, time, vitals, etc. If we look at the brain like a computer that interacts with the world as well as interacted with, I like to imagine that the brain is very complex and running many parallel processes. Like a computer, it has many parts of the interface to the world. Eyes are the screen, ears are the speakers, muscles are the mouse and keyboard, etc. I like to think of attention as the cursor; sort of a single process that directs what the user is interacting with. I'm positive that is much too simple of an analogy because it still leaves the question: why can't consciousness control multiple attention cursors simultaneously? In many ways, it does in which consciousness can pass things off to automatic processing, like triggering muscle memory and other previously strengthened pathways. But, I think the why there's not multiple attention processes running is still a big question yet to be answered. I think neuroscience still has a lot to be understood before we'll be able to answer it sufficiently.