There's been three thought-provoking features on brains and cognition recently, all equally interesting.

The first article is over on Discover.com: The Inner Savant. It discusses a topic that was very recently discussed in here in the Message Store -- autistic kids with gifts. This article mentions Nadia, who can draw a near perfect horse since the age of 3, starting with seemingly independent details (hoof, main, tail..); then connecting them. Another person can take the power of a six digit number 24 times in two seconds! Autistic kids don't have that higher level understanding, but can do wondrous things will the basic stimuli. The researchers then go on to argue that this capability is within all of us, just processing the raw information without concentrating on higher-level issues. I thoroughly believe this, and think the powers of hypnosis may be a good experiment...

Anyway, moving on. The second article is featured over on Kurzweil AI, If We Are Lucky, Our Pets May Keep Us As Pets. It talks a lot about uploading brains into computers, and how progress is being made to simulating an ape's brain. The question is wether a full neuron-by-neuron copy is required, or if more advanced AI algorithms are required. One issue that is not mentioned, which I believe is crucial, is imitation. If an AI copy of me is going to sit inside the computer, it needs to know how I behave. That's where learning by imitation comes into play.

And finally, the third article is over on the Guardian: Vivid Insight Provided Into Workings of the Brain. It discusses a tool that can virtually dissect human brains and see what's going on inside; it sounds painful! With it, they can detect how the brain wires up in children for example. The psychiatrists and psychologist will be over the moon :P

Nadia has been studied by researchers interested in creativity. Her ability to draw like a master painter from the Renaissance has left some researchers (like Alan Snyder) wondering whether there is a connection between genius and autism. One of the most interesting aspects of Nadia's case not mentioned in the article is that as she began to gain social skills, e.g. language skills, her drawing prowess diminished. Related work by Anna Karmilov-Smith and others studying the drawing abilities of young children suggest that the labels we put on the world have a great influence on how children represent it in their drawings.

Very interesting how she loses her drawing ability as her speech capability improves. It would seems her brain has a finite amount of potential...

I'm not sure that applies generally, as non-autistic people do tend to learn quite a lot without forgetting much of the essential details.

That's not quite the point that I was trying to make. It's not that Nadia had a finite capacity to learn new skills it's that as she learned language skills these interfered with the way she saw the world and her ability to draw it realistically. Like most small children Nadia, once she had acquired some language skills she began to draw the world the way she thought about it which had been affected by the acquisition of labels for things.

One of the toughest things for an art student to learn is how to draw what they see and not draw what they think they she. It requires deliberate effort for most people to see beyond the labels that we naturally place on everything around us and see what is really out there. When she was very young Nadia could see the world as it was without worrying about what she thought it should be because she had no language to describe it.

I'd also take issue with your claim that non-autistic people tend to learn quite a lot without forgetting much of the essential details. I am constantly experience interference between the different skills that I learn. OK. So I soon figure out what is wrong and correct it but that doesn't mean that interference doesn't happen. It's like trying to rub your stomach while patting your head: it takes practice to do some things that are naturally incompatible.

I've always said Natural Language is not that natural at all! The first things that come to us are noises, shouts, behaviours... language seems like a barrier to fight against.

So this case shows us that when it is assimilated, it tends to bias our perception of things... Even more interesting stuff!

As for humans forgetting, yes they do. But as they grow in experience, the important details stay. Clashes in 'different skills' can be resolved with a bit of practice, showing it is possible to learn more given enough time. That said, there's probably a saturation limit too (I'm getting close to that ;)

The Discover Magazine article reminds me about the Mentats in Frank Herbert's Dune series. They were human computers trained from birth to perform amazing feats of data analysis. I have believed for a long time that all people are somewhat capable of these sort of abilities. Some call it tapping into the Universal Conciousness (probably a little more metaphysical then this site normally sees :Þ). But, the idea is the same. Through meditation, you can shut down the concious portions of your mind and really start being able to solve problems and figure things out. As an example, I play billiards (8-ball, specifically) very well, but only when I am very relaxed. If I start tensing up, or getting excited. I lose it. It seems similar to the idea of being in the "Zone". Once there you can do amazing feats, but if you are distracted ...

Indeed, the Mentats are really cool, in a cold computational fashion...

It remains to be seen if this is possible with our current brains, and we just lack the teaching. The Bene Gesserit had to redefine teaching for their program to work, so no doubt the Mentats did too.

Interesting idea.

No doubt the Bene Gesserit used Genetic Algorithms to optimize their teaching program :)

However, I do believe that the brain's capabilities are increasing ever since (I don't know whether this is true from the scientific view) and maybe we aren't as far as yet as they are. Maybe.

Concerning the autistic people: Maybe they are just an example of using ~95% of our brain. The task is to find out the difference between us and them. Heh, maybe we could even use this solution for AI... that would be a leap in teaching computers to learn.

I think from generation to generation, human ability to learn increases more and more. We're becoming more and more open-minded, and capable of thinking on new levels (even compared to our great grand-fathers for example). That said, that's just an intuition... I can even prove it empirically!

During the second world war, in which Frank Herbert served with the NAVY,there were people who excelled at doing mathematical calculations who were called 'Computers' and others with eidetic memory and other abilities recruited by various war departments.
Often the abilities of these people are ignored in material about human capabilities where even what is 'normal' is not known. Even Richard Feynman mentions some of this in his writings on what he thought thinking is.
One of the writers in the stable of the MIT trained physicist and editor for Amazing Stories,John Campbell,was the science fiction writer,millionaire,and founder of Dianetics and Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard. Mr. Hubbard mentioned some of these things in print in DIANETICS in 1952 and earlier.
If people can't even agree on what 'normal' is and how someone can remember the exact position of many items on a board, or whether everyone 'talks' inside their head like HERMAN, the discoveries about autism are not surprising.I don't think the psychologists and others have yet laid a solid foundation to work with.

Hello: Laserblue

Your historical not written with high energy is very informative.

Indeed, people can have special abilities. For instance the first moment we all store a total picture, but most of us lose concentration to keep the signals running and then they lose a lot. Losing is good for we can function already with 5 % of the visual info. For other senses you could expect the same low percentage. But there are possibilities to keep a kind of photographic memory, certainly.

Much has to to with what we call regimes in the brains. The type of functioning. Alas I can't say much, for I can't trust everyone, because some things I post here are also new findings. But autism is a particular regime we all have as well. Only the other regime they don't have. This is a part of my job.

It's very good when someone will tell more for instance about waypoints in a next publication, then we know in what direction we can expect that, and that's only good.

So thanks Laserblue for your interesting posting, but in what year did you post it?

Ed van der Meulen