Narcolepsy

Narcolepsy is a serious disease. It can instantly shoot rapid stages of  sleep at any time. So you will fall asleep in almost any place this disease strikes. It is a sleep disorder and comes in a variety of stages or how harsh it is. Some are so harsh that in a day you can fall asleep 60 times. This is dead serious because without help or assistance then it can be fatal in case you fall asleep in the wrong place. We saw a video on this poor man who has a severe case of narcolepsy. He also has a disease where all his muscles just sleep too, and combined with narcolepsy it is highly dangerous. This man can fall asleep on an interview and even when walking on the sidewalk, you might laugh at him or what he does, but what if he fell asleep while crossing the street alone, or when cooking with a sharp knife? You should think more considerately and not be childish about this. This man is a fighter because without his will to continue his life with this rare and harsh abnormality then he would not be alive yet. So think about this and do something for a change.

Sleep and Dreaming

http://www.caricatures-ireland.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/sleeping-dreaming.jpg

Is a dream real? Does it show what we really desire? Dreams appear when we are sleeping. Dreaming is not as simple as "ohh we sleep and we immediately dream" it is far more complicated than kid's basics. Sleeping is composed of various stages that are continuously repeated various times as soon as we go to sleep. Scientists have developed many ingenious ways to test dreams, such as removing a cat's part of the brain that makes them be paralyzed during their state of sleep, and it resulted in the cat reenacting their dreams. This is a radical treatment that scientists refuse to try with humans. Also their is a scientist that proved that if woken during any other sleep state other than rem or rapid eye movement, the person will have positive thoughts or emotions and if woken in rem then they will have dark thoughts and emotions. Also they have tried to harness dreams. A scientist will flash a light to someone sleeping but this won't wake them but will simply make them aware of them being asleep. So the persons will be able to control their dreams. In conclusion dreams are fascinating but are still a mystery to u and we must wait till their secrets are revealed.

Genius, Savant and Autism

1. Explain in detail what "savant syndrome" means.

The savant syndrom can be gotten under certain circumstances and genetically. It means that the person is highly brilliant in a specific task but lacks in all others. Half the savants in the world have developed autism. It happens when the electro magnetic impulses in the left dominant side of the brain slow down to a almost non functional point.
2. What does genius mean?  Explain the difference between genius and savant.

A genius is a person who excells at most areas or a specific area while maintaining a greater strength in all other aspects. A genius is characterized for having an IQ of over 130. The difference between a Savant and a Genius is that Savants have a downside to being prominent in an area, and that is lacking inmensly in all other areas.

3. What is a stroke and how could it affect your mental functioning?Its a blockage in an artery that deprives the brain from oxygen, and thus disabling speech, and numbness, and eye vission loss. It could be permanent if not treated immediately, because the brain can not be deprived of oxygen.

4. What is a functional MRI and how does it help us understand brain activity?
It is a more specialized MRI that measures the hemodynamic response (change in blood flow) related to neural activity in the brain or spinal cord of humans or other animals. It is one of the most recently developed forms of neuroimaging. It helps us understand the mapping of the bran to a more detailed level related to blood and oxygen movement.

5. What is the corpus callosum and what role does it play in your brain's activity?
Its the flat bundle of neural fibers beneath the brain. Contains the most white mass, and it has been proven that it is generally bigger in musicians and artists, and it can be cut to reduce epilepsia.

6. What is epilepsy and how might it affect your brain's abilities?
Its a common chronic neurological disorder that damages the brain by making the part affected numb and facial expressions from that side are paralyzed.

7. What is autism?

 Its a disorder of neural development and it affects and impairs social behaviour and social interaction and comunication. 50% of all savants worldwide have it.
8. What is Asperger's Syndrome?Similar to Autism but detracts from it because of the linguistic and interest of those who have it. Some kids are inmensly interested in how molecular structure is at a early age.

WEB SITES

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

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

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

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

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

http://www.womensheart.org/content/stroke/what_is_a_stroke.asp

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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asperger%27s_Syndrome

http://www.epilepsy.com/epilepsy/epilepsy_brain

Synesthesia

1.Synesthesia: Synesthesia is aneurologically-based condition in which a sensory pathway automatically activates a secondary pathway.

2.Grapheme-Color Synesthesia: A type of Synthenesia in which numbers are perceived as colors.

3.Ordinal-Linguistic Personification: Is a type of Synesthesia in which days of the week, months, are associated with personalities.

4. Number-Form Synesthesia: Type of Synesthesia in which numbers, especific dates appear as a map to people.

5. Sound-Color Synesthesia: A type of Synesthesia in which music appears as colors.

6. Lexical-Gustatory Synesthesia: Synesthesia in which speaking, words and literature provoke the person to feel taste in the mouth.

LINKS

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

http://www.synesthesia.com.au/id1.html

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

Sensory Depravation

Sensory depravation is a very radical thign to do, and this experiment made shows how extreme this can be and how dangerous it can be. There is a video we saw earlier on a little girl who was kept secluded from every single aspect of society and this causes her brain connections to be lost and not be able to get a full brain capacity.This girl brought scienctists an excellent speciment to find out more about what seclusion can do to the brain and why. That little girl brought many questions to the scientists investigating her. Some are: Why is she so under developed or why can't she have full brain capacity. So in the new video we saw we can see an experiment on sensory depravation made by the United Statesto prove what Sensory depravation does to humans and its cure. The video shows how people start to lose it because of not being able to use their senses in life and at the end the mental result is amazing and shows that after the seclussion peopel where "slower" and more lost. So never seclude a kid from his problems so there is no problem because of miscomunication.

Accidental Savant

Accidents happen, are they always wrong? Well for the 2 guys in the videos we saw there are huge pros as well as bad cons. The first one can do huge calculations to a extreme level, and can "remember" over 20000 digits of pi. He doesn't see them but his brain does the formula and he gives out the formula by seeing it. Our second "savant" as we call them, people skilled in some areas better than others. Has mental retardation, but he has memorized not read memorized over 9000 books. He is walking encyclopedia, and knows many maps by memory.  The third is a guy who got a stroke that practically paralyzed his left brain side which granted him artistic abilities. Savants are born or created like the first one who gained his power by a stroke as a kid. Savants are great people we need to inspect to know and unlock our brains potential.

Trained Genius

Chess is a game of the mind. Some just don't have what it takes. Well the woman in this video proves genius genetics wrong. She is a grand chess master, and she got to that level of playing not thanks to genetics. She tells her story of how her dad taught her everything she knows, and how she became a pro. She practiced and practiced until she became one of the best. She plays by recognizing chess move the same as we recognize a face. This has been proven by using MRI. She is a trained genius and prodigy who is also revolutionary because she is a girl, which most men thought was not possible. She has a great perception and makes moves almost instantly because she remembers them by memory alone and does it almost by instinct. Her ability is awesome and she is good example that you don't need to be born a genius to be a prodigy at something.