Behind the Scenes of The Brain Show

by Zeev Nitsan

  The generic patterns in our brain enable the brain to devise future scenarios, and, in this sense, it is rather a successful prediction machine, despite the uncertainty surrounding us.

  Many opportunities in our life are not promoted by aggressive marketing. Sometimes, the front door to the rainbow is painted in gray.

  Multiple discoveries and inventions have a shared parenting of an alert brain and blessed randomality. As scientist Louis Pasteur once said, “Chance favors the prepared mind.” Chance is a hidden partner, more or less, of many spurts of thought derived from “happy accidents.” Serendipitous discoveries (discovered by chance, unintentionally) are like a muse in the carriage of randomality. Serendipitous revelations constitute an important component in science. (Discoveries such as penicillin or the effect of Viagra on male erection.)

  Some see a lucky event as a loan from the bank of destiny, while others see in it the fingerprints of Fortuna, the patron of luck. Thus, for example, one can observe Fortuna’s dance with each arm of Paul the Octopus, which enabled it to guess the winner of each football match in the 2010 Mondial—out of the eight matches that were presented to it. In practice, it was presented with boxes that contained food and were covered by the state’s flags of the competing teams, and its choice of specific boxes were interpreted as predictions of the winner.

  Fortuna’s touch is the magic touch of good fortune, which can sometime present a huge opportunity without us paying the price for it. Such a lucky event is part of many biographies of exceptional, successful figures, and it is often the key to understanding their exceptional success.

  Sometimes, the so-called randomality can be explained. An example of this is “Littlewood’s Law.” John Edensor Littlewood was a British mathematician whose insights led to the “miracle law,” according to which any person can expect to experience a miracle at the rate of about one per month. The law was intended to refute the existence of phenomena considered supernatural and is related to the law of truly large numbers; according to this, when there is a large enough sampling size, highly unlikely events will occur in high frequency. The assumptions underlying Littlewood’s Law are explained as follows. Let us define a miracle as an event that occurs in a frequency of one in a million. Let’s assume that during the hours in which a person is awake and conscious, he experiences one “event” per second. Assuming a person is awake and conscious eight hours a day, he will experience one million and eight thousand events in thirty-five days. In accordance with the definition of the word “miracle,” a person can expect the occurrence of a miracle once in thirty-five days.[11] Alternatively, there is a version that ascribes ten seconds to an event; thus, the frequency of miraculous events is reduced, and the average frequency of miracles becomes one miracle per year.

  In reality, most decisions have to be taken based on partial knowledge, and the percentage of the uncertainty component varies since “certain uncertainty” is an integral part of our life. Uncertainty is a basic quality in the world of phenomena, as it also derives from the uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics.

  While our brain predicts the future as an astrologer, it is worthwhile remembering the flaws in our prediction ability. The black swan is a concept that wandered from the lands of philosophy to the lands of social studies and economy and became a common term for describing an irregular event that is unpredictable in the horizon of our consciousness. Our prediction ability (“crystal ball skills”) mostly relies on our memory (the ability to look back to the past) and the momentary perception (the ability to see the present as it is). However, since the skills related to the documentation of past and present are only partially reliable, foggy clouds obscure the future visions in the crystal core between our temples. When the past casts too long a shadow over our expectations, we tend to look at the mirror that reflects what is behind us, mistakenly thinking we are watching in a glass panel that reflects what is in front of us. Our imagination sometimes finds it difficult to come up with reliable previews for our future feelings.

  “Absolute determinism” is a term that acquired foothold in the claims of the nineteenth-century French mathematician Pierre-Simon Laplace, who said that when the location of all objects in nature is known, as well as the natural forces that operate among them, an intelligent entity to whom this information is disclosed might be able to predict all future events. Nowadays, however, the common belief is that predications will never be perfect due to the randomality derived from the quantum mechanics theory.

  The present projects itself onto our foresight. Most people find it hard to imagine a tomorrow that is very different from today. When we are satiated, it is difficult for us to imagine ourselves gulping food at fast-food restaurant. It is hard to imagine the taste of strawberry sorbet while chewing a salty bagel.

  Our insights about the world do not contain full knowledge but, rather, “sufficient knowledge” to perform the various tasks of existence. As a result, our brain often operates in a pattern of a heuristic machine. Translating complex aspects of reality into simpler, heuristic mental schemes is, in a sense, a flattening of the depths of reality. But, in practice, this flattening enables the performance of tasks for a low energetic price (in mental energy coins) and with accuracy sufficient for survival.

  The brain has its own version of the Cassandra syndrome. Apollo bestowed upon Cassandra the ability to see the future. Once she rejected his courtship, however, he cursed her and told her that despite the truthfulness of her predictions, no one will listen to them. This is how it went when she predicted the fall of Troy. Underestimating the prediction ability of the brain that results from overestimating its inherent limitations is reflected in the sense of missed opportunity we sometimes feel as we say “I knew it”—the feeling we have in light of an event we predicted but did not act toward practical implementation of it.

  Partiality of Knowing

  The term “fallibilism” refers to an approach saying we have an inherent inability to achieve knowledge at the complete certainty level. Or, as philosopher Karl Popper once said, “Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.”[12]

  It seems the best understanding we can aspire to will be found at a distance of the “endless millimeter” from complete understanding; although it seems reachable, as it is an asymptote we will never be able to reach it.

  Knowing there is no such thing as full knowledge is a sobering insight. Although the light puddle of the candle of science expands its boundaries consistently, the darkness of not knowing will forever be part of our life.

  The origin of the logic discipline is found in Aristotle’s rules of reason from the fourth century BCE. Logic is deductive by nature (it applies inference from the general to the particular) and deals with arguments that are based upon premises affected by derivation and inference rules. This is even though most of Aristotle’s science was not supported by evidence but, rather, on “belief of the heart.” As opposed to it, Galileo Galilei’s science was based on experiments and was the basis for the empirical approach of modern science.

  Belief, which is sometimes referred to as “knowing of the heart,” is characterized by a lower level of certainty compared to evidence-based knowledge that was validated through an experimental (empirical) pattern.

  Many of our brain’s reality conceptualizations are formed according to the logical spirit of the scientific, empiric method, which means generalizing inference based on systemic accumulation of private cases. But the Achilles heel of this “reality clarifying” approach was pointed out by the philosopher David Hume, as early as the eighteenth century. Hume claimed that generalizations derived from private cases contain more information than the information that exists in the observations on which they are based. Does an observation of a thousand elephants, which are all gray, lead to the conclusion that all elephants are gray? Could it be that a group of albino elephants was hiding at a thick forest at the time of observation?

  In empirical s
cience, there is an inherent difficulty in reaching undoubted conclusions regarding the universal validity of the phenomena. According to philosopher Karl Popper, there is no scientific theory that cannot be refuted and theories are valid until proven otherwise. We all know the example of the hen that was devotedly groomed by its owner for many years until, one morning, it was sent to the slaughterer—a development it could not possibly predict based on its past life experience.

  It seems an essential condition required from a scientific hypothesis is that it will be refutable, but shall remain valid until proven otherwise. Science, in this sense, is a succession of new hypotheses’ building, which was built on the ruins of refuted hypotheses.

  Jewish resources reflect the complexity of knowing. On the one hand, it is said, “Wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness” (Ecclesiastes 2:13); in the same book we find the quote “For in much wisdom is much grief” (Ecclesiastes 1:18).

  Galileo Galilei added atypical restrictions for himself to the pursuit of knowledge when he said, “We – the human beings, as the owners of finite minds, should not attempt to deal with the infinite.”

  An ancient picturesque metaphor originated in China describes, in a simple, graphic manner, the ever-changing relations between the questions that were answered by human knowledge and the unsolved questions: the answered questions are presented as the perimeter of the circle, while the unanswered questions are represented by the area of the circle. Such representations demonstrate that, as the perimeter of the circle expands as a reflection of expanding human knowledge, the representation of the unsolved questions expands as well, since knowledge increases the number of questions regarding the unknown.

  Aspects of Dealing with Randomality

  The brain is constantly looking for patterns of order in the world of phenomena. Our brain is like Galileo’s; he threw objects from towers, shook pendulums and rolled balls downhill in order to identify repetitive patterns, in the world of phenomena, that can be phrased as natural laws in an attempt to weave threads of law and order in the bulb of capricious manifestations of the world of phenomena.

  The edge points of belief are reflected in the words of physicist Stephen Hawking, who said, “I have noticed that even those who assert that everything is predestined and that we can change nothing about it still look to the right and to the left before crossing the street.”[13]

  Many people who claim to have deserted their belief about the existence of the soul often look back, as did Lot’s wife, at the so-called deserted belief. This is well described by the saying “There are no atheists on a falling plane.” People usually navigate their belief in a pragmatic manner, as required by the complex circumstances of life and the way they are reflected in their inner world.

  Loyalty to a certain view “until the end,” without adjusting it to current circumstances in a manner of constant “reality testing,” actually reflects an “adjusting disorder” regarding life.

  Disciplines of knowledge, such as engineering, aspire to minimize the randomality component while relying on pillars of solid, factual information. When such disciplines interact with the world of phenomena, with its built-in randomality, the expectation is for an effect that will reduce the “average world randomality.” It is so we add a “low-randomality-rate” component, reflected in the engineering products, to the randomality component of reality. Nevertheless, even if randomality might be reduced, it will never cease to exist.

  Our brain has a hard time dealing with nonlinearity. On the other hand, we feel comfortable with linear causality. The “noise” that is the offspring of randomality tends to converge to the average over a long period of time.

  The waves of randomality approach the shores of our life routinely. In order to reduce the risk of a tsunami hitting the shores of our life, flooding randomly, we must be extremely cautious when we approach the undisputed territories of the kingdom of randomality (such as the stock exchange). The demon of randomality might not be tamed, but it seems it can sometimes be locked in a bottle.

  When our brain comes across life circumstances that pass a certain threshold of randomality (an intense randomality ingredient in the cocktail of our life circumstances), it might produce a chaotic thinking output. Our emotions tend to take the reins, and rationalism is tossed aside. One way or the other, the waves of randomality will wash up on the shores of our life. If we are cautious enough, however, and avoid reaching climate zones where the waves of randomality create a tsunami, we will statistically reduce the risk they will unexpectedly wash over the shores of our life.

  Looking at the “whites of the eyes” of randomality from a short distance is a situation that brings about rapid emotional burnout.

  We lay the fingers of our attention on life appearances in order to check the “world’s pulse,” but, due to the variance among these appearances, when this “pulse checking” occurs too often, we are exposed to an overdose of randomality and white noise, which shocks our consciousness. The more we sample life phenomena, the more we observe variance and the less we observe the core of the phenomena. Overexposure to randomality wears out the armor of emotions, and anxiety penetrates between the cracks, which is revealed and becomes a frequent visitor in our emotional climate living room.

  Our mental wellbeing will benefit from taking some time off from constantly dealing with an environment rich in wear-out randomality. It seems that our brain is more intended to act as a firefighter, who puts out fires whenever they break and enjoys rest periods in between, than as a stock exchange broker, who is supposed to respond to the constant changing of stocks graphs in real time and at any given moment. We need our share of escapism, which enables our brain to react better in the next confrontation it will be forced to deal with. An attempt to reach constant optimization does not come naturally to our brain and is often doomed to failure accompanied by “cerebral burnout.”

  The Brain as a Machine Intended for Prediction and Dealing with Unfamiliar Input

  Predicting the future is at the basis of our intelligence. Predicting the possible outcomes prior to acting is a survival tool that, as philosopher Karl Popper phrased it, “let your assumptions die instead of you.”

  Our brain serves as a crystal ball that tries to predict the future, as the famous science fiction author, Isaac Asimov, attempted to become a historian of the future.

  The operation pattern of prediction in our brain is reflected in its producing possible future scenarios that attempt to foresee the future. In this spirit, the philosopher Baruch Spinoza once said that “by using imagination and reason we turn experience into foresight.”

  Past Memories and Prediction of the Future

  There is a fascinating claim according to which the cortex can be defined as a system whose products are shaped by two main forces: memory and future prediction.

  Our consciousness is like a virtual time machine that sends us to tour the land of the past and the land of the future while our body exists in the present.

  One can conceptualize the brain’s thinking operations as a memory system (that stores information about past experiences) that is the basis for extrapolation and predicting the future.

  These two abilities mutually project on each other. Relying on past memories for the sake of predicting the future is a central processing pattern. Prediction enables the brain to place the predicted scenario in the field of the possible situations by combining memories of past experiences with updated pieces of information.

  The course of sensory input passes through the sense organs upward to the areas of sensory input processing in the brain. At the same time, our expectations, derived from “world patterns” encoded in our brain, are thrown downward, toward the sense organs, and affect both the incoming input and the processing of the input in our perception.

  Between the upward flow and downward flow of perception, there are feedback loops that feed the input with output that predicts the expected input. At the same time, the feeding of updated input
constantly updates the output that predicts the future input. The creation of a future memory, which is an expected-future scenario, mutually affects the past memory in a pattern of backward bias.

  Brain prediction is often based on probabilistic assumptions. Whenever there is an occurrence that does not match the prediction, the focus of attention turns to it immediately in an attempt to clarify the reason of deviation.

  To Know Yesterday What is Known Today

  “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards,” said Soren Kierkegaard.

  The concept of eternal recurrence is expressed in the book Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche. In this book he proposed an experiment in which a person relives his life over and over again in perfect accuracy.[14] Was it an unperceivable torture given the fact that he was not able to apply improved insights, derived by past experience, in order to change his actions for the best?

  The pleasant (sometimes frustrating) conceptual exercise that aims to reveal how acquired insights can improve our performance when we are faced again with the same type of challenge is described in the film Groundhog Day. In this film, the hero is caught in a time net and is forced to relive a specific day of his life over and over again until he improves his conduct, after which the arms in his life’s clock will circle again. The memory of the experience—reliving the same day over and over again—and the acquired insights help the hero improve his coping, and he goes on to win, picking the fruits of experience and memory. Finally, an escape route from the vicious magic cycle of endless repetition is revealed. The ability to apply acquired insights is at the basis of turning one’s brain into a “life’s expert brain.”