the machine of the mind workshopsession 11final

7/28/2019 The Machine of the Mind WorkshopSession 11FINAL

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The Machine of the Mind

Workshop

Professor Mary Cotter

Dr Steve Tucker


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Working in Pods in Groups of3

Introduce yourselves to each other. Try and geta mix of disciplines in a group

The tasks for today are to look at some material

on the Machine of the Mind and discuss itamongst yourselves and then well talk aboutthings in the class and see what everyone isthinking.

You will also have a group task to complete andhand in, answering a number of questions.

Choose Class representatives


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Figure 9-9ab (1 of 5)

The surface of the human brain (the cerebralcortex or cerebrum) is made up of different

lobes


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Figure 9-13

The limbic system is an old part of the brain

The limbic system is involved in emotion, learning and

memory, very strong connections with temporal and

frontal lobes.


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Figure 9-16

Different sides (hemispheres) play roles indifferent tasks

Reasoning and data,

linguistic andnumerical analysis

Spatial perception and

artistic tasks


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Question 1: Comparing Joe and Susan what

would you deduce about normal function?


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Question 2: Discuss what aspects of mind areaffected by the frontal damage?


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Personality?

What do we mean by personality?Interaction of our experiences and genetic

inheritance.

Creates a unique pattern of neuronalconnections that is our personality.

Diseases such as schizophrenia(fragmenting of the mind) cause major

changes in personality. Affects ~1% of

people.


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Schizophrenia?


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Gerry has a very extreme case of schizophrenia.

Question 3: What effect does schizophrenia have on

the mind?


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Treatments?


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Schizophrenia not primarily a structural

defect:

Unlike the cases that we have considered so far,

Schizophrenia does not seem to have an anatomical/

structural basis, at least initially, but rather relates to an

imbalance in neurotransmitters in the brain.

Excess of dopamine (and insufficient Glutamate)

particularly in the hippocampus have been shown to be

important.

A number of patients respond well to drugs which

reduce the effect of dopamine.


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Advent of medication


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Remembering

Remember the musician CliveWearing?

Worst recorded case of anterograde amnesia


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Jeanne Calment, 1875-1997

Arles, France

The oldest person in the

world

Rode a bike until 100, stopped

smoking at 117.Remembered Vincent van

Gogh in her uncles shop in

1888.

Ive only got one wrinkle and Iam sitting on it


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Repetitive motor tasks


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What happened to his musicalskills?


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The evolution of the forebrainand cortex

The human brain


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Question 4:

Look at the structures in the birdbrain, rat brain and human brain.

Think about what you have just seenin the last two videos.

Where do you think Clive Wearingsmusical skills are stored?


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A lot of what we know about basic brain

mechanisms comes from studying much simpler

creatures, which give us an understanding of howthings work.


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Question 5:What part of our brains is being manipulated by

magicians?


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Figure 8-24, step 1

(wheretransmitteris stored)

Synapses are where nerves talk toeach other

Nerve cell 1

Nerve cell 2


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The drugs that worked so well for Valerie, block

the message getting through because they

prevent the receptors on the second nerve fromreceiving the information coming from the

previous nerve.

Many drugs work in this way.


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Figure 8-24, step 1

.Nerve transmission is very quick.so needmechanisms to get rid of neurotransmitters

1.


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Question 6:

The Neurotransmitter Serotonin is taken back up

into the nerve that released it.

If a drug was given which prevented the reuptake of

serotonin, what would be the effect on the second

nerve?

Would serotonin have a bigger or smaller effect

than normal?


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Figure 8-24, step 2

Another way is to destroy the neurotransmitterwith enzymes

2.

(they break thechemicalstructure)


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Question 7:

Dreaming is associated with increased release

within the brain of the neurotransmitter

acetylcholine.

Acetylcholine is rapidly broken down at synapses

by the enzyme acetylcholine esterase.

If individuals are given a drug which reduces theaction of acetylcholine esterase, would those

individuals experience more or less dream sleep?


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Figure 9-17

Question 8:What areas are primarily activated in the tasks

shown?


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Scientific Method

The unique human cases that we have consideredgive invaluable insight into what parts of the brain

might be doing, but need to have much more robust

evidence.

Observation and experimentation are key elementsof scientific enquiry.

An investigator observes an event, and using prior

knowledge, generates a hypothesis.

Need to test the hypothesis by designing an

experiment which manipulates some aspect of the

event.


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Collect data/ results and see whether they support

hypothesis.

If not reject hypothesis and change it.Need replication.


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Many human studies are observational.

In 1951 Hill and Doll studied what happened to30,000 doctors who were either smokers or non-

smokers in terms of the likelihood of getting lung

cancer.

By 1954, 37 doctors had died of lung cancer, all of

them smokers. None of the non-smokers had died of

lung cancer.

43% of smokers died between 35 and 69, only 15%

of non-smokers.


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Question 9:

Much of what we are

learning now aboutthe brain/mind is from

imaging .

Looking at theseimages from the same

brain, what do you

think the person might

have been doing at

the time the upper

scans were made??


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Other studies are interventional drug trials.

1. Compare treatment and control groups.

2. Controls receive a placebo (sugar pill with no

active ingredients).

3. Neither subjects nor experimenters know whichsubjects are receiving treatment or placebo.

4. Sufficient numbers of subjects.

5. Subjects are randomly assigned to a group.

= randomized, placebo-controlled double blind trial


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Time for you to design an experiment:

Claims have been made by a major food companythat consumption of blueberry juice significantly

increases intelligence in primary school children.

You are given access to the local primary school

and charged with testing this claim.

Question 10:How would you design the experiment?

the machine of the mind workshopsession 11final

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