5 ms·
How the brain increases blood flow on demand
- Insanity 1y agoAlways fascinating to me how we are brains, trying to understand how we work. Cool research!
- motoboi 1y agoAre we though? If you look closely at it, there is no evidence that brain causes consciousness, just correlation.
- WantonQuantum 1y agoThere's a massive amount of evidence that consciousness occurs in the brain. If one were to propose that it's just a correlation then some kind of convincing argument would need to be made about how and why.
- nis0s 1y agoTrue, and there is also plenty of evidence which snows how neuronal degradation in some pathways leads to losing aspects of consciousness.
- teiferer 1y agoI read GP comment as "there is no evidence that everything having a brain is conscious (and vice versa)", not as "the place where the individual's consciousness operates is the brain". The former could be applied to whatever LLM is the hype of the day. It's interesting though that the only consciousness that I'm sure of exists is my own. Anybody else's is just somehing I'm assuming. You can measure intelligence, but not consciousness.
- imchillyb 1y agoI believe there is thorough, observable, evidence to suggest that consciousness is manifest exclusively through the brain. Persons with damaged brains have damaged consciousness. Persons with underdeveloped brains have underdeveloped consciousness. People without functioning brains have no detectable consciousness. There is a metric ton of observed and collected data on consciousness. Of course evidence does not equal proof…
- motoboi 1y agoI appreciate your point, but be sure to take a look at the current state of the mind-body problem to understand that those evidences you brought up point to the brain as mediator of consciousness, not the cause.
- Timwi 1y agoThey absolutely point to the brain as the cause. To suggest otherwise is to introduce unscientific/superstitious concepts like souls or whatnot, which violates Occam’s razor. If that’s the road you want to go down, come back when you have independent evidence for that.
- konfusinomicon 1y agowhy did it name itself brain or whatever linguistic origin that brain is ultimately derived from. perhaps it was Brian and some brain out there made a typo and here we are today
- treetalker 1y agoHe's not the seat of consciousness — he's a very naughty boy!
- SlowTao 1y ago"I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this." - Emo Philips
- kulahan 1y agoAlong this same line of thought, I've always found it particularly fascinating that the universe is exploring the universe through molecules arranged into humans. Is the Universe the conscious one here?
- hnuser123456 1y agoWhat I never got is, why do we experience anything? Why can't the universe exist as a simulation where people do people things without having to consciously experience it all? Why can't I just shut off my experience and let my body do whatever it would do without having to put in effort, the same way everyone else's body does whatever it'll do without me having to experience everything they do?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- lithocarpus 1y agoThere might be one like that out there but no one will know about it.
- CoastalCoder 1y agoFriend, let me introduce you to the topics of philosophy, theology, and cosmology!
- tasty_freeze 1y agoDavid Chalmers coined the phrase "the hard problem" of consciousness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_problem_of_consciousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_problem_of_consciousness
- pessimizer 1y agoThe two big problems: 1) Why is anything? and 2) Why am I here and you're over there?
- rramadass 1y agoThe Hindu School of Philosophy named Samkhya/Sankhya gives you the appropriate Worldview in which your questions are answered - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samkhya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samkhya There is an "Objective Reality" (mutable, evolves into many forms and includes both material/non-material concepts) and a "Witness-Consciousness" (immutable and attributeless). The latter is embodied in one form of the former which we call Sentient Living Beings. But we forget the distinction between the two and experience reality through its own subjective evolutes within the embodied being i.e. Sensory Mind, Intelligence and Ego. Various techniques/practices have been prescribed in Samkhya/Yoga/etc. to break out of this illusion and realize that one is simply pure awareness/consciousness beyond any experience. This is what is called as Kaivalya/Moksa/Nirvana i.e. a state of mind in which there is total freedom from everything to do with objective reality. See also the paper A landscape of consciousness: Toward a taxonomy of explanations and implications and previous discussion on it here - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40844824 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40844824
- jimmygrapes 1y ago> Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves. Heres Tom with the Weather. -Bill Hicks Don't take this as downplaying at all, because it's a fantastic and uplifting revelation, so long as one doesn't presume they're the first to consider it (it is even better this way imo)
- grishka 1y agoA physicist is just atoms studying other atoms.
- bozhark 1y agoSo you can get brain hard?
- crackrook 1y agoYou can get nose hard too! https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeymoon_rhinitis https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeymoon_rhinitis
- searine 1y ago[flagged]
- andbberger 1y agoHHMI is a private org
- lukas099 1y agoSo's Harvard Medical School, right? But they get research grants from the government?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- nomel 1y agohttps://finance.harvard.edu/financial-overview https://finance.harvard.edu/financial-overview Looks like they received $1 billion in private + government grants, so upper end would be 15%? > The University ended fiscal year 2024 with an operating surplus of $45 million compared to $186 million in fiscal year 2023, on an operating revenue base of $6.5 billion. Wow!
- searine 1y ago2025 funding news "At least 350 Harvard medical grants were terminated by the Trump administration." https://abcnews.go.com/US/350-harvard-medical-grants-terminated-trump-administration/story?id=122221156 https://abcnews.go.com/US/350-harvard-medical-grants-termina... "At Grim Town Hall, Harvard Medical School Leaders Tell Staff to Expect Layoffs and Far-Reaching Cuts" https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/4/16/trump-hms-cuts/ https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/4/16/trump-hms-cuts/ "Snapshots from front lines of federal research funding cuts" https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/07/snapshots-of-battle-from-front-lines-of-federal-research-funding-cuts/ https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/07/snapshots-of-...
- HardCodedBias 1y agoBrain blood perfusion is quite amazing. I don't understand from their research if 1) The the blood flow is following the computational/metabolic demand (via the endothelial cells communicating via gap junctions) 2) the brain is signaling the endothelial cells directly. Maybe the paper explains it, or maybe more research required.
- evanjrowley 1y agoRecently I started taking an angiotensin II receptor blocker as a medication to lower my blood pressure. The first week was difficult because my body couldn't significantly raise blood pressure during periods of sustained effort, like exercise and yardwork. I believe I'm over this now. Fortunately, the medication seems to be effective and I haven't experienced any negative side effects yet. Some people who take this medication have reported bad side effects, including "brain fog" while using it. I wonder if/how this medication might interact with the blood pressure control mechanisms observed in this research.
- mediumrhino 1y agoI also take an angiotensin II receptor blocker and my experience has been similar. Additionally, I experience a perceived effect on stress levels as my pulse and blood pressure do not rise in stressful situations. On the negative side, I definitely have a harder time reaching my maximum pulse when working out.
- gddgb 1y ago[flagged]
- Danjoe4 1y agoBP meds are dumb. Lose weight
- mediumrhino 1y agoYou assume that everyone has enough fat to shed to arrive at a desirable blood pressure. This is not the case.
- thrawa8387336 1y agoWorse, once you start it is very very hard to leave them