Posted by OddipusRex on June 20, 2003, at 17:13:08
This is fascinating. It's from an article in NYTimes magazine. He says that blocking some brain functions with TMS will allow these savant functions to be uncovered. Now this would be worth chasing down a TMS zapper wouldn't it?
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. He has used TMS dozens of times on university students, measuring its effect on their ability to draw, to proofread and to perform difficult mathematical functions like identifying prime numbers by sight. Hooked up to the machine, 40 percent of test subjects exhibited extraordinary, and newfound, mental skills. That Snyder was able to induce these remarkable feats in a controlled, repeatable experiment is more than just a great party trick; it's a breakthrough that may lead to a revolution in the way we understand the limits of our own intelligence -- and the functioning of the human brain in general.
...He first got the idea after reading ''The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat,'' in which Oliver Sacks explores the link between autism and a very specific kind of brain damage. If neurological impairment is the cause of the autistic's disabilities, Snyder wondered, could it be the cause of their geniuslike abilities, too? By shutting down certain mental functions -- the capacity to think conceptually, categorically, contextually -- did this impairment allow other mental functions to flourish? Could brain damage, in short, actually make you brilliant?
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/22/magazine/22SAVANT.html?pagewanted=1
poster:OddipusRex
thread:235527
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030617/msgs/235527.html