OT: losing memories (was Re: How many of you are Extreme Programmers?)

[Erik Max Francis]

Stephen Horne wrote:

> Experts are only expert in particular fields. Just because Einstein
> was a genius in the field of physics, that did not qualify him to
> state that only 10% of the brain is unused. Assuming he claimed it at
> all - I never checked, but it does get attributed to him now and again
> - it was probably never intended as a statement of strict biological
> fact.

It's an urban legend:

	http://www.urbanlegends.com/science/10_percent_of_brain.html

In fact, I've never even heard it attributed to Einstein.

In some attempt to contribute some positive value to this already
off-topic thread, I discovered something which I thought was insightful
when I was watching a Nova (or some other such high-quality PBS program)
concerning patients with severe brain injury.  Many -- and evidently
this is not at all uncommon -- those who suffer severe brain injury that
leads to profound impairment of physical abilities cannot remember
things being any different.  So not only has the injury caused the
damage, but it also tends to remove the ability of the victim to
remember what things were like before the injury.

One particular example was of a young woman who suffered severe injury
(I cannot remember whether it was due to physical trauma, coma, or
hypoxia ... in any case).  She was unable to walk and was now confined
to a wheelchair, and as she was being given some basic assessment tests
(which she was doing very poorly at, as you might expect), the doctor
asked her if she remembered things being any different, like being able
to remember things or walk.  She thought about it, and said, "Nope."

I'm not really sure whether I find that comforting or not.

-- 
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