This Is Your Brain On Life

Da Vinci "Study of Brain Physiology," c. 1508

Have you ever been unable to make a decision, a tiny one as insignificant as what to eat for dinner, or how to spend your day? Turns out there’s a lot more that goes on inside the brain when it comes to decision-making than one may, um…think. The science of the mind is an interesting field, one that is still somewhat of a fledgling, with new ideas and tests and findings every day. The last 20 years alone have seen a massive amount of new research on the physiology of the brain and why we develop diseases like Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and addictions of all kinds.

I never thought about this much until a couple of years ago when I was introduced to an expert in the field, someone who will simply be referred to as “Brain Lady,” a moniker she not only responds to, but one she enjoys being called. Over the course of many weeks I learned from her a bit about how the brain works, mostly focusing on the limbic system, the area that specializes in moving dopamine to and from the brain to your other parts of the brain and body including physical reactions. Dopamine is the chemical of the brain that controls the flow of information and is responsible for our memory and every-day problem solving.

When dopamine is released it provides feelings of enjoyment and reinforcement to motivate us to do, or continue doing, certain activities. Dopamine is released by naturally rewarding experiences. You are hungry, you eat, and dopamine is released. Even in chimps, it’s the same reaction. Studies show they even start craving the reward of food and drink when they are given audible stimuli before their food and drink appear, which can promote a flood of dopamine in expectation of the reward. If this sounds Pavlovian, it is-- only now based on modern scientific facts from MRI's, CAT scans and all sorts of brain wave testing which involve human and simian heads hooked up to wires.  Where Pavlov could only observe, we are now able to test chimp and human brain responses while these choices are made. The more we know about the chemicals at work in the brain, the better we are at figuring out some disorders in our DNA, or at least find some way to counterbalance things than the ones we have now.

Jonah Lehrer is the science writer who brought much of this new research to my attention, going beyond what Brain Lady's education on the subject.  Lehrer's latest book is called “How We Decide,” but I found Lehrer through his very cool science blog called The Frontal Cortex.  If you are in any way interested in the science of life, this blog is the best thing I’ve seen for telling it like it is and giving you the findings in English. So often scientists know how to do the research and proceed to publish their findings in nearly incomprehensible ways. While not a scientist himself any longer, Lehrer is a translator of sorts; he puts things into context and knows science to explain it in a human way so that people like me can fully understand them.

But the main reason his latest book resonates is how he described his reason for writing it in the first place. It revolves around one simple assignment-- to get cereal at a grocery store. There he was, in the breakfast aisle and, in his own words…

“And it wasn't until I got to the supermarket that I realized that there were 20 different kinds of Cheerios. There were original Cheerios. There were honey-nut Cheerios, apple-cinnamon, multigrain, the yogurt-with-the-berry thing. And then, of course, there are all the generic varieties of Cheerios...And so I found myself spending literally a half an hour, 30 minutes, in the cereal aisle of the supermarket, trying to choose between boxes of Cheerios. And that's when I realized I had a problem, and I became really curious as to what was actually happening inside my head while I was struggling to make a decision.”

I don’t have this problem with cereal but I do remember my mind re-adjusting when I moved home after living abroad in Europe. The small Tesco we shopped at in Belfast was a twelfth of the size of any normal sized Safeway or Albertsons. The carts were half the width and depth of U.S. shopping carts and there are so many choices of flavors and brands, at that moment American largess smacked me in the face. And then if you’re shopping for another person or people, it seemed crazy to choose for them based on the sheer size of products on the shelves. Someone who washes their clothing in Tide probably has a preference of scent or not, if scent, which scent; do they have a front-loading washer or not, do they like fabric softener or not, dryer sheets?…etc.

But I relate in many other ways with some of the stories Lehrer’s book addresses and it will break your heart when a woman who was put on medication to combat her Alzheimer’s, goes on a medication which is a dopamine agonist, a common practice which helps with the loss of dopamine neurons. But guess what? The drug infuses her system with such dopamine reactors, she develops a gambling addiction, loses her entire life savings, then her husband-- who could no longer stand her 18 hour a day addiction to slot machines-- all because of a drug that was supposed to save her mind.  Two weeks after she was taken off the drug, no compulsion to gamble. 

In the modern world we live in we have a lot of choices.  Some are basic choices and others involve a lot of information processing from a variety of media that we’ve never had to deal with before. We have task lists and choice lists, and phone lists and to-do lists that are work generated or simply life generated. Bottom line, we’ve got a lot going on in our brains and it will be interesting to see how science continues to research the portholes of our minds.

One of the most forward-thinking science writers of his time (1848-1899), Grant Allen championed Darwinism, traveled the western hemisphere and, was an interesting soul. With a prolific pen, Allen wrote science articles, many books and then even went on to author controversial novels, the most scandalous involving strong women and their sexually promiscuous behavior (move over Hester Prynne) —but he did so under the pseudonyms of women.

Allen was one of a few of his time who upheld Darwin’s theories. I am not sure of the exact date this poem was published, but I think it’s brilliant, and that it resonates the same meaning now as it did in the late 1800’s.

A Ballade of Evolution
by Grant Allen

In the mud of the Cambrian main
Did our earliest ancestor dive:
From a shapeless albuminous grain
We mortals our being derive.
He could split himself up into five,
Or roll himself round like a ball;
For the fittest will always survive,
While the weakliest go to the wall.

As an active ascidian again
Fresh forms he began to contrive,
Till he grew to a fish with a brain
And brought forth a mammal alive.
With his rivals he next had to strive
To woo him a mate and a thrall;
So the handsomest managed to wive,
While the ugliest went to the wall.

At length as an ape he was fain
The nuts of the forest to rive,
Till he took to the low-lying plain,
And proceeded his fellows to knive.
Thus did cannibal man first arrive
One another to swallow and maul:
And the strongest continued to thrive,
While the weakliest went to the wall.