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Can You Get Smarter?

nytimes.com

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Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#21

Post by dfan »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #4
monort wrote: post #3

This is more dreadful, than ageism. From linked paper: For example, longitudinal studies have reported between 1% and 2% annual hippocampal atrophy in adults older than 55 years without dementia (e.g., Jack and others 1998). Other regions also atrophy in late adulthood, including the prefrontal cortex, caudate nucleus, and cerebellum, at estimated rates between 0.5% and 2% per year. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/ar…

That is terrifying. I'm 32. That means in slightly over 20 years I am going to slowly become brain dead. By the time they cure death in my 70s, I will be too old to enjoy it unless they also can reverse this.

Do you look at everyone around you who is 55 and think of them as slowly becoming brain dead? Do you look at people in their 70s and think none of them is enjoying life? 32 is way too early to be terrified of aging.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#22

Post by jsprogrammer »

hawkice wrote: post #20
arbitrage wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your analogy isn't appropriate. The brain is not made of muscle tissue.

The purpose of the analogy (as I understood it) was that there are important, extremely large effects that are caused by behavior X (in this case, exercise). But if we put exercise to the same test, we would fail to notice those important and extremely large effects. So by using so little training, we learn little about what effects it _could_ have -- it could work, but we wouldn't know unless it worked 10-100x faste…

This is fallacious, inductive reasoning.

The behaviors are not the same. It is not valid to draw a post hoc conclusion from one to the other.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#23

Post by marincounty »

kator wrote: post #13

My dad went from being an auto mechanic to learning to code when he was 63 and he's 77 now and argues with me about Drupal vs Joomla over dinner. It's only one sample but I'm convinced him switching careers extended his neural plasticity considerably.

I'm not saying you do, but I have found the general public vastly underestimates the intelligence of many auto mechanics--especially today's mechanics.

I guess they have always been an easy target in movies, etc.?

I have a feeling your dad could learn anything if given the right structure. Mechanics are underpaid, expected to continually learn on their time, provide $20,000-30,000 grand worth of tools; and the owner is the only one making a real living.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#24

Post by iagooar »

marincounty wrote: post #23
kator wrote: post #13

My dad went from being an auto mechanic to learning to code when he was 63 and he's 77 now and argues with me about Drupal vs Joomla over dinner. It's only one sample but I'm convinced him switching careers extended his neural plasticity considerably.

I'm not saying you do, but I have found the general public vastly underestimates the intelligence of many auto mechanics--especially today's mechanics. I guess they have always been an easy target in movies, etc.? I have a feeling your dad could learn anything if given the right structure. Mechanics are underpaid, expected to continually learn on their time, provide $20,000-30,000 grand worth of tools; and the owner…

That's interesting. From what I experienced, in some of the European countries mechanics earn pretty darn good money, have pretty acceptable working conditions and are respected in general.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#25

Post by marincounty »

iagooar wrote: post #24
marincounty wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying you do, but I have found the general public vastly underestimates the intelligence of many auto mechanics--especially today's mechanics. I guess they have always been an easy target in movies, etc.? I have a feeling your dad could learn anything if given the right structure. Mechanics are underpaid, expected to continually learn on their time, provide $20,000-30,000 grand worth of tools; and the owner…

That's interesting. From what I experienced, in some of the European countries mechanics earn pretty darn good money, have pretty acceptable working conditions and are respected in general.

My perspective is from the U.S.

I would like to see them unionize. I sometimes think they could pull it off in the Bay Area, especially San Francisco.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#26

Post by Nimitz14 »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #22
hawkice wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The purpose of the analogy (as I understood it) was that there are important, extremely large effects that are caused by behavior X (in this case, exercise). But if we put exercise to the same test, we would fail to notice those important and extremely large effects. So by using so little training, we learn little about what effects it _could_ have -- it could work, but we wouldn't know unless it worked 10-100x faste…

This is fallacious, inductive reasoning. The behaviors are not the same. It is not valid to draw a post hoc conclusion from one to the other.

.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#28

Post by JoeAltmaier »

Devid2014 wrote: post #9
DiabloD3 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is terrifying. I'm 32. That means in slightly over 20 years I am going to slowly become brain dead. By the time they cure death in my 70s, I will be too old to enjoy it unless they also can reverse this.

The cure to death even partially is probably more that 100 years away from us.

'Even partially'? Such cures are found every day in the form of treatments for disease, healthy living rules, improvements in diet and exercise regimes.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#29

Post by jsprogrammer »

Nimitz14 wrote: post #26
jsprogrammer wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is fallacious, inductive reasoning. The behaviors are not the same. It is not valid to draw a post hoc conclusion from one to the other.

.

It is still inductive.

There is zero reason to believe "there's a better chance it is so than otherwise".

You may wish to brush up on your logic.

Re: Can You Get Smarter?

#30

Post by TeMPOraL »

DarkTree wrote: post #7
mamon wrote: post #6

"six weeks of brain training, with 10-minute sessions three times each week" - this seems so insignificant amount of practice that no reasonable person would expect it to have any effect. More interesting thing would be measure person's IQ before and after doing their quantum physics PhD studies - few years of intense work should do the trick of making you smarter.

This isn't even enough time to significantly increase your strength at a gym, which we know is possible and observable. Why anyone would think this is enough training to produce noticeable effects baffles me.

More imporantly, unless there's a hidden software in brain that responds precisely to that particular training, you'd expect that anything that can yield significant results by doing it 3x a week for 10 minutes would be already discovered purely by random chance.
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