Do you think you are born with empty brain cells, or is there information from your ancestors already there?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_memory

Well, we are born with some innate abilities like sucking to be able to feed. And, I assume the experiences in-utero affect the brain. I don’t think you actually remember things from your ancestors though. I do think genetics plays a part in how we are “wired.” There is the theory of past lives. You might like the book Many Lives Many Masters.

Tabula rasa. I do not know enought about genetics to make an educated statement, but for now, I believe the brain is a blank slate of synapses that need to be trained.

@oreo45 So essentially, no lol.

Plenty of a priori information in there already. All non-novel problems which have been solved during evolution are in there, as is the information necessary to acquire language (Chomsky’s Language Acquisition Device) and all the information needed to form neuronal connections in the service of solving novel problems (e.g. problems not solved during the evolutionary process.)

Is it information, @dpworkin—i.e., content—or is it just the capacity to acquire and retain the information? Structure and content are different, it seems to me.

@Blackberry I was tring to be a bit netral, some things I agree, and others no. i think we posess a kind of instinct in some areas.

I believe there is something we know…...or can feel…...may be our destiny, the fact we are supposed to be here to experience this.TO BE

@Jeruba It is both structure and information. The LAD contains information about generative grammar, and a structure for learning specific grammars. The solutions for the non-novel problems are pre-coded information, and the capacity to create the necessary structure to solve novel problems.

Boy, I’m glad I’m not answering this Q first. I would be so modded.

I think I was born with empty brain cells, yes. I’m still looking for something to fill them with.

I would like to believe in the collective consciousness as I have heard it called. I don’t know though. Jury is still out.

@Blackberry I find it hard to believe a baby is born with a blank slate. Don’t all of the cells of a newborn have some kind of information in them? If so, why wouldn’t the brain cells have some sort of information in them as well?
So what you are saying is, the newborn is born with absolutely nothing in their brain cells. They’re just empty?

@Blackberry Do you have any sources for that tabula rasa nonsense, or are you just spewing?

The more we hear something the more we can or could relate to that sound or word(s). “I love you” is a biggie! So is “you suck” or “you could do better”! This is registered at a very early age way before binkies and blankies..moms and daddies or Aunties and Uncles who primarily pave the foundations of our lives….

Some of us are born with brain cells already packed chock full of data…
The rest of you appear to be born with blank brain cells…

Why do you think some kids struggle so hard trying to learn the simplest ideas, while others appear to be reminded of these ideas, as opposed to having to try to learn them?

… and some of the data that some folks’ brain cells are packed with is shit, but they’re holding onto that shit for all they’re worth.

@davidbetterman I don’t know if you are joking or are serious. But, I think all newborns are born with some memories. For instance, my son was tapping his hands on pots and pans, making some sort of music. He was only 1, and would move in time to the sounds he was making. When he was near 2, I made drums out of oatmeal boxes cut off at different heights. I made tinker toy drum sticks, and he would play for hours. The sound actually began to sound like music. He became a wonderful drummer. I ask him how he knew how to play all the instruments he can play? He said, I don’t know, I just do. He never had lessons and plays the piano, organ, guitar, and drums. With the drum set he has to use all for limbs doing something different with each at the same time. I truly believe that develops the brain further. He is extremely smart and knows things that he doesn’t know why, but just does. It all started somewhere, and I believe he inherited brain cells from past relatives, which many are PHD’S in different fields. However, I raised him alone, along with his sister.

So, if you think newborns are born with a blank slate, why aren’t all children falling in line with the same IQ? Why such a drastic difference? Are we attributing it to environment, teaching from birth to 8 years, or a combination of that and genetics?

@Rangie just because babies are born with blank slates (if they are; let’s assume that for now), that doesn’t mean that differences in capability and nurture don’t exist.

@Rangie
I am not joking. I seriously believe that we are born with information already stored in our brain…
Of course, many people are forced to ignore this pre-programming (as it were) by our parents, friends and teachers who don’t understand us, and in their fear they berate us and try to force us to conform to accepted learning patterns.

@davidbetterman I also seriously believe that we are born with information already stored in our brain. I just can’t believe any cells in our bodies are totally empty of information. Some say red hair, some say long fingers, some say brown eyes, some say how our voices will sound. They all seem to say something, so why would the brain cell be void of any information? Somebody will have to prove it to me to change my mind.

Of course our cells are not completeley empty. We have a sort of “basic programming” or instinct if you will. as far as actually inheriting brain cells with information content from ancestors, not just basic data, i don’t think so. and @Rangie your son sounds like a case of a savant

The latest research is revealing some surprising new discoveries that challenge traditional concepts. Without getting into detail, there are two major discoveries to consider.

The first, is that we actually have two brains. Our first brain to form actually creates the heart. This first brain remains intact throughout our lifetime, and has been found to work in tandem with our cranial brain for controlling neurological functions.

The second discovery is that non coding RNA (ncRNA) within our pseudogenes (junk dna) is being demonstrated as the mechanism to cause neurons to fire. Your DNA is actually controlling your thinking. So it follows that information inherited from the parents is programmed into the DNA which controls the brain.

@WolfFang I thought a savant was extremely smart in one area, but not so in other areas. My son is very normal in every way, but he has an enormous vocabulary, an ability to figure out mechanics, music, and many common things. He is now a stay at home dad. His baby was born, and came home from the hospital with whooping cough. He somehow knew how to care for him. His wife is a school teacher so she went back to work, by choice, so he quite his job to stay home and care for his newborn son. Mind you, he has never been around babies before in his life. When the baby coughed so much he actually stopped breathing, dad knew what to do and get him going again. That sweet baby just turned 3 years old. The other day the little one came out and ask me “Grandma, have you seen daddy belt black”? Then he stood there with a little frown on his face, and started over. He then said ” Grandma, have you seen daddy’s black belt”? Now, I ask you how does a 3 year old know proper construction of a sentence? There is a long list of PHD’s on his father’s side of the family. Do you suppose he inherited something in his brain cells?

@Rangie well, looking into that info RealEyes was talking about, it may be that he inherited some sort of “patterns” or extra information from his parents. It’s really intriguing, but its close to unfathomable how much we have yet to learn about the human brain :) oh man its crazy to just think about it, but your son’s abilities, if I understand correctly, can still be classify him as a savant. There are different types of savants

@WolfFang But, what about his son, the 3 year old? They are both normal in every way, except they seem to be quite smart. This morning the son of my son, the 3 year old, couldn’t get his way with his mom. First he start to cry, and then turn to her and calmly said, “I am not very happy” and went on to do his thing. The 3 year old seems quite capable of trying to carrying on a conversation with any adult. He is not shy, has no intimidation from grown people. I just find him amazing, not like your average grandmother.

@WolfFang You know you are right, it is unfathomable how much we have yet to learn about the human brain. You know how you will get a twitching muscle in say your arm? I have worked on trying to get inside my brain and sending a message to the muscle that is twitching to stop. With only a little concentration now, I can accomplish it. It use to take longer. Now I am working on healing small things like a sore throat, earache and little pains we get. I believe our brain is a very powerful thing, and we have only to learn how to use it. After all it controls our entire body. So why can’t we train ourselves to control it?

It’s blank, but there are inherited characteristics. You can inherit inclinations in certain areas of aptitude. Rangie’s son doesn’t remember his fathers experiences of learning music, but he’s born with an aptitude in this area, as was, certainly his father.
My son is good with music and languages and numbers. These are inherited ‘gifts’ if you will, along with a good portion of his IQ. But he’s still a blank slate and needs to learn.

@Rangie
It will be very hard to convince those who didn’t use their inherent abilities that these abilities exist.
It is quite amusing to see who knows that the brain actually does have information inherited from our ancestors (and thus available to us from birth on…) and those who choose not to access this data, and thus don’t believe it ever existed…

Of course, you will not remember who you inherit this data from, but the brain cells are not simply vacant…like a blank chalkboard awaiting information.

@davidbetterman I have wondered this for a very long time. I have watched, taken note of various individuals in my extended family and have come to the same conclusion that you have. Until somebody proves me wrong, I will keep on believing it. And in fact I believe we can reach much higher goals with trying to communicate with our own brain. I believe it is very possible to do, we just need a little more information on just how to go about it. But, I am not waiting for scientific information. I am experimenting on my own. I am sure the brain is powerful enough for us to tap into and make it work for us, not us work for it.
Thanks davidbetterman, I love meeting someone that is willing to step out a little further than most.

@cazzie Yes, I agree, there is much to learn. However, I believe there are certain things already imprinted in the brain cells of newborns. Certainly not all they need to know for life experiences. Learning will always be an important part of becoming a well rounded intellectual individual. But, I still say there are certain things they are born with, that may or may not give them an advantage in life.

@Rangie…. I thought you a young man, sorry.. because ‘Rangi’ means boy in Maori… sorry…

@Rangie My pleasure.
If you are waiting for scientific evidence, you will wait a long long long long time. Scientists will never be able to prove this, although it is quite obvious to most of us who are blessed with the insight into its reality.
Once you begin to truly tap the potential that exists within you (indeed, within us all) you will find yourself opening up to many fascinating experiences.
Read Jonathan Livingston Seagull for some interesting aspects into this (also, Bach points out that only one in every 100,000 gulls ever really opens up to his/her potential)!

@cazzie . you are funny. I had no idea what it meant. But I will tell you how it came about. When my granddaughter was born, she had thin red hair that stuck up in the air. She had arms long enough to reach each side of the incubator. Her legs were very short and a little chubby. Her skin was very fair and she had big blue eyes. When they brought her to the window, I said, oh my she looks just like and orangutang baby. So I started calling her Rangie. She will be 16 on this Sunday. She has beautiful redish blonde hair and is 6“1“tall. She is a great basketball player. In fact Stanford University has been scouting her for 2 years. She has 2 more years in high school. She has close to a 4.0 average. Again, inherited brain cells. Athletes and scholars in her background. She loves her nick name and we now have a special bond between us because of it.

@davidbetterman I don’t have time to wait. I am 67 years old. In fact most great thing have been discovered by common individuals like myself. I will continue to explore the capabilities of my brain power, which is far more power than any of us use in our lifetime. I find it exciting what I can learn about my body, especially by brain. If it works for me, who is to say it can’t?

I think it’s called DNA?

@Rangie… you talk of the brain as if it’s separate from you… we can learn to control it? We can certainly build it, by exercising it, and we can also, according to some Behavioural Psychologists, effect our emotions and well being by practising thought patterns. Have you heard the self help books called… something like… Changing your Inner Voice… Positive Self Talk…. that sort of stuff? I have no doubt that that helps.

I remember reading J.L Seagull as a kid and it just blew me away.

My son is quick with math and counting concepts. Is this because I did accounting for 15 years? No…. I did accounting because I’ve always liked numbers and using them in practical ways (as opposed to the trig and physics formulas I struggle with) but my son has inherited my traits and my husband’s traits through his DNA… like his hair colour and skin colour. If we could inherit the knowledge of our ancestors, we’d be a MUCH better race of animal…. I wish we could. Maybe we’d stop making the same mistakes over and over again.

Sorry, but babies are not born with information from ancestors.

A baby is already afraid of heights for example. Like our ancestors.

To a certain extend there’s actually a reverse process called pruning which means a newborn baby engages in “emptying cells” over many months (more precisely cutting synaptic connections).

The babies being afraid of heights is a evolutionary instinct. It’s not knowledge.

I think each baby is born with a range of possibility for IQ and talent, like lets say Sam has the genetic capability of having an IQ between 120 and 140, and then based on environment he will either fall on the low side or the high side of his own range. I think this is true of almost everything, likelihood to get certain cancers, ability to dance, ability to play an instrument, etc.

I think the three year old that can construct a proper sentence has been listening to the adults around him, and probably lives with adults who speak proper English to him all of the time. I think PhD homes as you mention, probably treat their children more like little people, than children to be seen and not heard. I am going by my own personal experience, not any real data. A lot of language has to do with environment in my opinion, because we see consistently that children raised in bilingual homes are a little delayed in both languages compared to a child raised with one language. I am sure even with language it probably starts with a natural ability, but then in the right environment you get impressive results.

@cazzie – Evolutionary instincts can been seen as information from our ancestors. This instinct is part of the synaptic connections between nerve cells of a newborn baby.

@mattbrowne well, instincts that we are born with isn’t what she was talking about. She was talking about ‘knowledge’... so.. information from our ancestors?? inherited instincts we’re born with… ok… but some sort of knowledge that my parents (or gr.gr.gr. grandparents..) learned during the course of their lives that is somehow passed down to me, uh uh.

@cazzie I don’t think our brain is separate from us. I speak of our brain as a part of our body, as a motor is to a car. I don’t speak about any of this as if I know anything about it. I just find it very interesting and what I say is just my own little opinion. I haven’t read anything about the DNA or scientific information on the brain. It is just my own dreamed up idea about our brain. I find all of your opinions very interesting and gives me more to think about. Thanks.

@mattbrowne How do you know this. Have you studied the brain of newborns? I find what you say interesting, but I am curious as to how you came to know this.

It depends upon if you consider “us” as nothing more than a physical body, or if you consider “us” as a mind which controls a physical body.

Brain is a physical thing. It is part of body. Mind is an immaterial agent. It is only represented by the body, but it is not the body. The medium is not the message.

@JLeslie You are right. The 3 year old is treated like a little person. Mom is a teacher, and dad is very smart, and has been a stay at home dad from day 1, when baby came home from the hospital. Neither parent forces anything on him, but they do introduce many things to him. When he misbehaves, they don’t raise their voices, they do not spank, but they do take the time to sit down and talk to him. They do use the time out method, which they started at age 2. By the time he reached the age of 2½, when the parents said you have a time out, he would go directly to his chair and unhappily sit there until his time was up. He also would tell his older siblings to go to the time out chair when they were not behaving. I just spent 4 days with him and his family visiting us. I found myself just watching him. He has a mixture of 3 year old and mature young man, rolled into one. He is probably the most well balanced little boy I have ever seen.

I saw a study done with chickens, where they trained a hen to run through a maze to get to its food. Then after the hen hatched some baby chickens, they put the little chicks in the beginning of the maze, and they ran straight through without even one fault, to the food. What would you call that? How was that information transferred to the baby chicken?

@JLeslie Any delay in bilingual children is gone by the time they start school… or do you mean children who only speak one language at home while living in a community that speaks another? That I can’t speak to, but my bilingual child is above average in both languages.

@Rangie…. what study? Do you have any names? Where it was published? That would be big news on the behavioural studies profession.

@Rangie I would call that complete nonsense left over from the days of the highly discredited Lysenko, and his predecessor, Lamarck. I’ll kiss your ass on national TV if you can prove that ever happened.

@cazzie Oh yeah, minor delays. Certainly by school age it is all sorted out, I completely agree. This is actually one of the reasons I don’t like ESL for children who are raised even in single language homes that are different than the language in school. Young children have no problems speaking both languages.

@JLeslie Really? Is this in the States? ESL for little kids? How can English be their SECOND language?? They don’t even HAVE a language yet.. That is completely silly. They’re going to learn right along side the other kids. We have Polish neighbours and those kids are speaking Norwegian almost as though they were born here, (11 and 4) after living here a year. (If anyone is wondering, Polish and Norwegian are NOTHING like each other)

I don’t know about chickens, but Zebra Finch’s have presented some interesting insights.

St. Louis researcher Wes Warren from Washington University’s Genome Sequencing Center was interviewed about his latest findings on the Zebra Finch appearing in this Months Journal Nature.

Warren has demonstrated a different mechanism than mere “interactions of neurons within the brain”. He seems to have discovered what causes those interactions to occur.

“We show that song behaviour engages gene regulatory networks in the zebra finch brain, altering the expression of long non-coding RNAs, microRNAs, transcription factors and their targets. We also show evidence for rapid molecular evolution in the songbird lineage of genes that are regulated during song experience. These results indicate an active involvement of the genome in neural processes underlying vocal communication and identify potential genetic substrates for the evolution and regulation of this behavior.”

The implications of this are staggering, as “The zebra finch is an important model organism in several fields1, 2 with unique relevance to human neuroscience3, 4. Like other songbirds, the zebra finch communicates through learned vocalizations, an ability otherwise documented only in humans and a few other animals…”

We once again find another use for the so called Junk DNA. It seems that when the Zebra Finch expresses a DESIRE to sing, that desire causes a change in sequence of the “long non-coding RNAs, microRNAs, transcription factors and their targets.” And thereby, a change in that sequence, is the very mechanism which causes the “interactions of neurons within the brain”.

“Two of the cDNA clones that measured the most robust increases27 align to an unusually long (3 kilobases (kb)) 3′ untranslated region (UTR) in the human gene that encodes the NR4A3 transcription factor protein (Fig. 4a). The entire UTR is similar in humans and zebra finches, with several long segments of >80% identity”

“These findings indicate that this NR4A3 transcript element may function in both humans and songbirds to integrate many conserved microRNA regulatory pathways.”

“It has been proposed that ncRNAs have a contributing role in enabling or driving the evolution of greater complexity in humans and other complex eukaryotes32. Seeing that learned vocal communication itself is a phenomenon that has emerged only in some of the most complex organisms, perhaps ncRNAs are a nexus of this phenomenon.”

As well, we have discovered Primate Olfactory genes in human pseudogenes. They are turned off, but they are there nonetheless.

My point being, there is much more to consider than brain activity for inherited information. The information is in the genes. And the pseudogenes are demonstrated to control the brain activity.

@cazzie @dpworkin I saw it on TV a few years ago. I have no idea who did the study, sorry. I just remember seeing it. By the way dpworking, there are better ways to to challenge a person, than what you suggested.

@cazzie Yes, in the states. My niece and nephew’s first language is Spanish, but their mom was offered ESL for the children in school, she turned it down. Her son came here starting first grade, he already spoke English well. I think since he had probably checked a box Hispanic they maybe just automatically offer it? Not sure. Her daughter was 3 when she came here, no English really at all. Her first few months in pre-school were very difficult for her, poor thing. But of course she caught up. The parents are fluent in English, but insisted on Spanish in the home. I think they were smart.

It doesn’t have to be me kissing your ass. I could buy you a case of Mumms.

@JLeslie… the difference here is,... if both parents speak another language, like my neighbours who are Polish, the school has to offer them a ‘morsmål’ class… so the kids will get a class in their own language so they don’t lose it.

@dpworkin I think that is more appropriate. However, you get to save your money, because I can’t prove anything. It was something I saw on TV a few years ago.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies THAT is good stuff. I’m going to be reading into that…Thanks!

@cazzie Really? How can that be done for every language? Or, maybe in Norway you don’t have as many different immigrants coming into your country? When my husband became a citizen he took the oath in Miami among 3000 others on the same day. They represented 70 countries.

Of course that is not 70 different languages, but still.

@Rangie you should read Richard Feynman’s CalTech commencement speech on Cargo Cult Science (easily googled by that term alone), which speaks precisely to how the chicks ran the maze correctly. (I’m guessing that they never controlled for scent, so the chicks followed the scent of their momma to the food.)

But just because someone doesn’t know how chicks run a maze—or how to properly control an experiment—doesn’t mean that they have magical internal knowledge.

@cazzie Plus, how can the child lose it if that is all that is spoken at home? They may lack written skills, but not verbal.

They lose the literature and respect for the language. It gives them a sense of identity and pride.

They do it, and I’d have to look up the stats, but there are many different languages represented here.

@CyanoticWasp That is very interesting, I never thought of that. I am open all ideas and opinions. It gives me more to ponder.

Thanks, @Rangie. That’s why I love that speech of his so much.

@cazzie I’m not against the idea, I think it is fantastic, but it would be unrealistic here I think. Many parents do put their children in classes outside of regular school to maintain the home language if it is a language not already taught in school. In the US Spanish, French, German, Japanese, and Chinese can be found in our public system, and also Latin many times. I doubt Polish is taught in any of our Public Schools…maybe in a few specific communities. Language taught in Public schools is not to supprt a family’s language, but to help the child in the world, so languages that are seen as useful in business are more likely to be offered. And, unfortunately many places in America don’t offer langauge in Elementary school, some not even in middle school. That is the case where I live now, and I find it outrageous.

I love reading how most folks here are in denial that this obviously is happening for some of us.
Too bad the rest of you had to work so hard to learn what same of us were born knowing.

Sour grapes…LOL

@Rangie impressive. Yes we can have 2 way communication with our brain but I’d imagine it would be hard to navigate all the different pathways and possibilities. kinda like hacking a computer. Maybe someday I’ll invent a system that can act as an interface between us and our brains, to tap into all the parts of our brains that we can’t even access and use the parts we can access even more efficiently. its allways been one of my sci-fi fantasies haha

@Rangie – Here are some articles

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synaptic_pruning

http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/plast.html

“Over the first few years of life, the brain grows rapidly. As each neuron matures, it sends out multiple branches (axons, which send information out, and dendrites, which take in information), increasing the number of synaptic contacts and laying the specific connections from house to house, or in the case of the brain, from neuron to neuron. At birth, each neuron in the cerebral cortex has approximately 2,500 synapses. By the time an infant is two or three years old, the number of synapses is approximately 15,000 synapses per neuron (Gopnick, et al., 1999). This amount is about twice that of the average adult brain. As we age, old connections are deleted through a process called synaptic pruning.

Synaptic pruning eliminates weaker synaptic contacts while stronger connections are kept and strengthened. Experience determines which connections will be strengthened and which will be pruned; connections that have been activated most frequently are preserved. Neurons must have a purpose to survive. Without a purpose, neurons die through a process called apoptosis in which neurons that do not receive or transmit information become damaged and die. Ineffective or weak connections are “pruned” in much the same way a gardener would prune a tree or bush, giving the plant the desired shape. It is plasticity that enables the process of developing and pruning connections, allowing the brain to adapt itself to its environment.”