Task Processor Found in Human Brain

I don't think it is true by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 21:22 · Score: 0

Human brain may be a good computer but with pretty slow interconnect - that's what counts

Re:I don't think it is true by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 19:52 · Score: 0

I think its possible, except that we would use a logical-language, language is about communications and even though we don't need it to think alike because we would think logically, we would still need to transfer information/knowledge to each other that we experience from our POV, so that logical choices can be made more clearly. The transfering of knowledge would require it to be in a form of language. Perfection is a matter of perception, if we were logical we would know that nothing is perfect because of the intricate details involved. For example, we would need a lot of information before we can ever accurately predict the weather, or other things, there are just to many variables involved, some day we may have all the variables necesary to predict just about everything. Another example is card counting.
Re:I don't think it is true by Jordy · 1999-05-14 22:42 · Score: 1

Not true... you must remember that the human brain is massively parallel and doesn't work on a binary system, but rather analog. An electrical pulse may have variable intensity and the reaction may introduce variable amounts of chemical reactions...

This speeds things along considerably. Now... if we just had a more efficient way of exporting and importing data into our brains... we'd be set. I mean, if you could just plug yourself in and learn everything there is to know about a particular subject in a fraction of a second... you'd be set :)

--

--
The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.
Re:I don't think it is true by ToiletDuk · 1999-05-16 11:55 · Score: 1

I know Kung Fu!
Re:I don't think it is true by RoLlEr_CoAsTeR · 1999-05-15 09:25 · Score: 1

Perhaps that's because we cannot think in pure logic. maybe, just maybe, thinking purely would enable us to see clearly, and everything would be revealed to us and relating thoughts (at least through words) would no longer be necessary because we would know what each others' thoughts were. Of course, thinking in pure logic is impossible with the brains that humans have, and because thinking in pure logic involves perfection, a condition which I do not believe exists on Earth, at least not in your run-of-the-mill human. Jesus, on the other hand, is/was the exception....

however, I think this is true, or at least could be... then again, I wouldn't really know, would I?

--

Insert mind here.

Re:life imitates art by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 21:44 · Score: 0

Approximately -40 years. It's called LSD.

Re:life imitates art by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 21:44 · Score: 0

You mean you're not consciously multithreaded already? It's all about having enough caffeine.

Stacks by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 22:35 · Score: 0

"The result of this study suggests that the anterior prefrontal cortex ... mediates the ability to depart temporarily from a main task in order to explore alternative tasks before returning to the main task at the departed point," said Dr. Jordan Grafman, a co-author of the study.

Departing temporarily from a task sounds more like a subroutine than multitasking to me. This is more in line with saying that the brain has an efficient stack mechanism so that it doesn't forget what it was doing.

Re:Stacks by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:01 · Score: 0

No it's true task-switching. You can switch to task A to task B, then to task A, then back to task B. Much like reading and talking on the phone (you pay more attention to what you're reading, the person complains, then you talk a bit before going back to the text, then the person complains you aren't paying attention again...)
Re:Stacks by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 22:46 · Score: 0

No actually, you got the concept a bit wrong.

A subroutine is part of the same task, like you having to add 2 numbers before multiplying, but a change in task is more like thinking about completely diffrent things by switching back and forth between them.
Re:Stacks by InfiniterX · 1999-05-15 07:01 · Score: 1

Well, my brain must not go too far w/o a stack overflow since sometimes I go to the grocery store and in the process of driving there I forget what I came for. I sometimes forget what food I want to order at a restaurant because I concentrate too much on talking with people at my table before the waiter comes to take my order.
Re:Stacks by fornix · 1999-05-15 00:17 · Score: 1

Departing temporarily from a task sounds more like a subroutine than multitasking to me. This is more in line with saying that the brain has an efficient stack mechanism so that it doesn't forget what it was doing.
Yes that seems to be what's going on. It appears to be a type of temporary memory.
We have to take these types of studies with a grain of salt, however, since what they are really measuring is changes in blood flow. While increased blood flow to an area generally means that area is working harder, it tells us nothing about what it's really doing, or if there are other important areas without increased blood flow that are eqally important for the phenomenon.
In any event, this part of my brain seems to be missing. Now what was I doing?
Re:Stacks by jsdkl · 1999-05-14 23:27 · Score: 1

There was something on 20/20 or Dateline or a similar TV show a while ago about people who start something, then go to do something else, and completely forget what they were doing and where they were doing it. Perhaps the got some cheap memory...It seems like the computer analogy is becoming a little more clear in some ways.

Re:Megahertz and cache... by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 23:02 · Score: 0

Don't ask, the hardware of the brain are pre-historic: switching speeds are measured in milliseconds and no caches; RAM size is about the same, but access times suck. That is all: a cpu, some memory, and a top-of-the-line sound card. Most shoppers would not buy a computer with such configuration. We must mention one detail though, this machine is not only able to work on data but can manipulate CONCEPTS. Big difference.

Re:Megahertz and cache... by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 00:31 · Score: 0

As a follow-up to my AC post above, I quote from Russell's book, "Artificial Intelligence, a Modern Approach."

A crude comparison of the raw computational resources available to computers (circa 1994) and brains:

COMPUTATIONAL UNITS: Computer: 1 CPU, 10^5 gates ; Brain: 10^11

STORAGE UNITS: Computer: 10^9 bits RAM, 10^10 bits disk; Brain: 10^11 neurons, 10^14 synapses

CYCLE TIMES: Computer: 10^-8 sec; Brain: 10 ms

BANDWIDTH: Computer: 10^9 bits/sec ; Brain: 10^14 bps

NEURON UPDTES/SEC: Computer: 10^5 ; Brain: 10^14

Human brain is not a computer by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 01:42 · Score: 0

I remember a comic strip showing some prehistoric tribesmen carving out a life-size mercedes benz in wood - while looking at a photograph of the real thing.

We are doing the same thing with computers, but in fact we don't understand a fraction of the brain.

Re:Human brain is not a computer by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 22:54 · Score: 0

I find your comments ironic, think for a moment...

If we do not understand a fraction of the brain, how would we know, or more specificly how would you know? if we don't understand a fraction of the brain we don't know it and neither do you, you are just being a cave man trying to say that the picture of the mercedes should be larger and would require more time to create, so you know just as much as any man about how far we are, and definetly no better.

Dennett is an idiot by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 05:39 · Score: 0

I cannot even read more than a page of Dennett
without being annoyed. He's like a cross between
Bertrand Russell and Dr. Wayne Dyer. (Hint:
I don't like either of them, either.) Russell
ended his long career by writing short fiction. Terrible short fiction. So bad, it's good -- or
would be if it weren't so terrible. If Dennett
starts writing fiction -- no, that way lies madness.

Chess by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 06:47 · Score: 0

Like with ANY computer, it is completely unfair to compare a specific task and generalize it into a blanket statement.

Just because Deep Blue (with its 256 dedicated Chess ASICs, 32 PowerSP2s, and full knowledge of Kasparov's strategies) could beat Kasparov, doesn't mean it could beat him at another mental task (say, Go)

Tom

Re:Chess by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:07 · Score: 0

Admit it, the human brain is not all that good when thinking purely mathamathically.

Computers are.(for now anyways)

Genetic engineering anyone?
Re:Chess by scheme · 1999-05-15 08:55 · Score: 2

Admit it, the human brain is not all that good when thinking purely mathamathically. Computers are.(for now anyways)

I disagree entirely. Numerically computers may be bettter but mathematically no. Computers aren't very good at proving theorems and coming up with new ones(the theorem provers out their really aren't that great despite a few interesting successes). Mathematics consists mostly of proving theorems and coming up with new ones. Thats what math people have been doing for the last 200+ years. Frankly from my experience with my math profs, I wouldn't trust them to multiply two reasonably large numbers without making a mistake.

--
"When you sit with a nice girl for two hours, it seems like two minutes. When you sit on a hot stove for two minutes, it

Re:Brain Capabilities by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 06:51 · Score: 0

What time you got up yesterday to go to the bathroom,

7:14:08.154

what color socks you wore 3 weeks ago,

black, with dark-blue horizontal stripes

what you ate for dinner months ago

you want it in chronological or alphabetical order?

i can also tell you which day of the week it was on any date.. and lots more!! cuz i'm an idiot-savant ;-)

Cyberpunk? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 07:34 · Score: 0

I think I've seen this before...

Memory issues by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 07:58 · Score: 0

It is like this:

- short term: task context, what I'm doing now, ALL the info I'm using to do some programming (this only in 'deep hack' mode), the next task to do.

- long term memory: everything else, organized by some random priority (age?)

So, the short term memory can be very large, but need a refresh cycle (DRAM). The long term memory does not need a refresh, but it's indexed in complex ways, and sometimes you 'lose the path' when the indexing token does not work anymore.

Yes, you can remember everything from your long term memory. It seems to use some sort of dynamic compression, the information being compressed when you sleep (that's why sleeping 'clears' our mind).
When using some kinds of hypnosis, you can 'recall' all that info.

I personally use my short-term memory to pass on exams. I recall everything needed from long-term to short-term, using the 'style' of the exam (this means I need some previous year exams most of the time) to put it in a easily accessible way, and keep refreshing. Then I do the exam in deep hack mode and 'clean up' after the exam, free'in all the malloc'ed 'local heap' space.

I hope somebody understood ;-)

Re:Memory issues by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-16 04:48 · Score: 0

Wrong in detail :(

There are many more kinds of memory than that.

Linguistic short-term: used to compose sentences &c. The existence of this is still debated.

`Normal' short-term: This is the 7+-2 one.

Long-term classificatory: This is the memory that says `things like that are trees' &c. Probably a Hopfield net, if you ask me.

Long-term associative/autobiographical: The place where you remember `what happened to me' &c.

etc etc.

Lots of things might be memory and might not, eg `how to ride a bicycle' is probably not memory per se, but rather an internalised, now-automatic routine for riding bicycles. Code and data get confused. (Hey! The brain *is* written in Lisp after all!)
Re:Memory issues by Ben+Hutchings · 1999-05-15 08:30 · Score: 1

Yes, you can remember everything from your long term memory. It seems to use some sort of dynamic compression, the information being compressed when you sleep (that's why sleeping 'clears' our mind). When using some kinds of hypnosis, you can 'recall' all that info.

You can reconstruct it, but the details are unlikely be correct. It's lossy compression.

Re:That report is no good by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:05 · Score: 0

Isn't it interesting that some people alway thinks that human is THE best speci around?

To be honest the human body and its capabilities are quite limited... quite primitive if you ask me.

Short-term vs long-term by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:05 · Score: 0

Think about short-term as DRAM and long-term as secundary memory (i.e. harddisks).

Re:Short-term vs long-term by FreeUser · 1999-05-16 10:19 · Score: 1

That explains all those bad sectors I have to remap every Monday morning after a long weekend of alcohol consumption!

:-)

--
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy

Somebody misunderstood it. Film at 11. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:07 · Score: 0

It's not multitasking. It's normal task-switching. Like Ctrl-z, fg (read: suspend into background, put back in foreground). We do not do two processes at the same time.

Missed interrupt. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:14 · Score: 0

You don't "lose" an interrupt. It makes you switch back to the other task immediately (as the timeslice is dynamic and much more than 1 sec). But then, your ear has already lost track of what you heard (since it was a kind of 'daemon' (unix sense) that triggered the interrupt, and it had to _read_ (in computer I/O sense) the whole sentence.

The same goes when going back to coding: your eyes are not at the wrong place, and you have to reload a realy big RSS (running set size, for non-Unix people - the memory a process uses). So you lose time switching, but since it's _static_ info (you can read it again and get the same info) you do not get as much lost.

Of course, if you had some time, you could "replay" the sentence to find out where you've been; but it's often faster (and more reliable) to ask the other person to repeat.

Sorry about my bad english full of mispellings [sic].

Slashdot and off-topic by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:26 · Score: 0

Well, as a result of your "useless" article we are having lots of thoughtful comments above about how our minds work, long-term vs short-term memory, and deep hack mode. You just didn't get that the slashdot community can dif thoughtful issues out of even the most moronic articles.

I think it's YOU that need a life.

Re:Most powerful brain additive by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:41 · Score: 0

There was a star trek: Voyager episode where something like that happened I believe.

Tuvok went undercover to do check into this underground of physics on an alien colony that traded in violent memories, it was like a drug to them.

Re:Humans already are programmed =) by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 08:48 · Score: 0

Which brings up the following quote (paraprasing here..)

"There is no right, there is no wrong; there is merely public Opinion."

- AC #7133925

Dolphins' brains are more powerful. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 12:06 · Score: 0

...evidenced by the fact that they don't need to build computers.

Or cities.

-ad

Re:Dolphins' brains are more powerful. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 17:04 · Score: 0

Shame they'll all be dead in the year 2038 when i take over the world.

Thanks by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 14:28 · Score: 0

I didn't remember that by the time of my posting.

That's why jpegs seem too natural - they try to compress as close as possible to the method the brain uses.

BUT - how about some kinds of hypnosis that make you remember every tiny detail of something? They put your brain in autistic mode? Or is there something more strange?

Re:Thanks by Mr.+Slippery · 1999-05-16 12:56 · Score: 1

It's questionable as to how accutate hypnotic recall is. People have been induced to have precise and detailed recollection of events that never really happened. The most visable of these cases would be "alien abduction" stories and many (not all) "repressed memories" of childhood sexual abuse, especially those about ritual Satanic abuse.

--
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood

It this Segfault? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 14:33 · Score: 0

Try reposting there - it's the kind of article they have. www.segfault.org.

Screw that, where's the OFF switch?! by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 16:51 · Score: 0

Heh. It's in my fridge. Otter Creek Copper Ale.

Dig it.

ADD == Time Blindness by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 16:59 · Score: 0

I have been diagnosed with ADD. It explains a lot of problems in my life, but Ritalin (which is a true miracle) helps greatly. It isn't perfect, but the FUD surrounding it has been deafening at times.

Anyhoo, the best characterization I can give ADD is being time blind. The clock has absolutely no weight to it when I'm unmedicated. It's hard to explain, but it's just like there is absolutely no difference between 15 minutes from now and 15 years from now. Things just don't have urgency to them, and what is going on now that is interesting is vastly more engrossing than things that need to be completed or done soon.

My memory for things that don't interest me suck, and I have absolutely no problem whatsoever doing something for 12 hours straight or sometimes much much much longer. It's like the rest of the world fades to black and NOTHING can tear me away from something I'm interested in.

Just my two cents.

Re:ADD == Time Blindness by gavinhall · 1999-05-15 20:17 · Score: 1

Posted by Open Matrix:

I have to agree with you on this one. I don't have ADD but my sister and father both have it. I've seen my sister sit for hours doing her homework and you go over there to see what kind of progress she is making and you see she hasn't done one thing because her mind has been wandering to God knows where and she doesn't realize hardly any time has gone by. I've also seen my mom yelling at the top of her voice at my sister and my sister is basically paying no attention to her because she is so caught up in what she is doing and when you finally get action out of her by disciplining her it's just enough action to keep mom from disciplining her any more but even all through this yelling and whatever she still is focused on whatever she's fantasizing about. I do see how this could have it's advantages but it sure makes the person seem VERY selfish and uncaring. I think this is why this is considered a disorder. I also think this could be very dangerous in situations (i.e. driving) were you really need to focus on something that is boring.

Re: Multithreaded Thought by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 17:09 · Score: 0

There is nothing wrong with being Multithreaded, i.e schizophrenic, the problems come with the brains lack of control over all the `threads`. If the brain could control all of these 'threads' then the human would becomg stable and be just like you and me. It would just confuse the hell outta ya, thats all :P

Re:Most powerful brain additive by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 17:14 · Score: 0

There is a way of controlling your mind to do what you are suggesting, it involves a lot of time and Tai Chi Chu'an or Chi Kung. There arts are based on the theory of knowing yourself and understanding what is around you. I have done this for only a short time by comparison to many others, but already I can control the sub-conscious chatter in my mind, allowing me to 'turn it off' which is a very useful talent. If you are interested to know any more about this, then find a class near you, study hard and you'll find that I tell the truth

anyone wants to email me

th886755@stmail.staffs.ac.uk

if you just wanna slag me off, dont bother, it's a waste of my time, but if you wanna talk and discuss this in more detail, then please do email me :)

Kosh has left the building

Re:Humans already are programmed =) by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 17:31 · Score: 0

Look at how well the mind can be programmed. We don't start out knowing our native language, but by the time we've learned it, we find it almost impossible to think without using it (unless we've learned another language very thoroughly)

Maybe I shouldn't even open my mouth here, but though English is my native tongue and I have had only a very little bit of German, I can't relate to "thinking" in English (or German for that matter.) I just have thoughts, which are combinations of images, odors, sounds, taste, touch, emotions, et cetera and the myriad connections they have related to the topic at hand and other related ideas. I have to make a very deliberate effort to properly convert my thoughts to English. Consiquently, I have difficulties at times properly conveying what I'm thinking about.

I know I'm not the only one like this. I have two friends who say the same thing. Can anyone else out there relate to this, or have I managed to find the only other two freaks on the planet like me? ;)

Anonymous, just so the nice men in their clean white coats don't come looking for me...

Re:How many high order tasks can you do? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 19:18 · Score: 0

How about have two separate conversations simultaneously?

e.g. English with mouth and ears and sign-language with eyes and hands.

FYI by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 19:28 · Score: 0

Analog is just word that means higher resolution digital.

Everything is discreet, everything is made of something smaller, there is even a mathmatics and science about it, quantum machanics, quantum chunks, etc.

Re:Attention, tasks, and lack of definitions by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 20:01 · Score: 0

Parellel processing is like a more specific type of mutlti-tasking, such as walking and chewing gum would probably be considered parellel processing, while thinking about one thing, thinking about another and then going back and forth between 2 or more things, is more like a single processor doing multi-tasking.

Re:life imitates art by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 20:08 · Score: 0

Maybe you already are multithreaded consciencely. You would never know because you are only one thread and the other thread does not know you exist. :)

Re: Multithreaded Thought by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 20:16 · Score: 0

Our brain already controls them, via our conscience. :)

Consider this for a moment, the biggest thing about multi-tasking is that it is using information to work on something, each thread is working on a diffrent part of memory, for example in computer multitasking, each thread is given its own stack space as to not mess things up, for example if you are thinking about eating and you are writing something simultaniously you might accidently spell the word "sandy" as candy, but that seldom happens, now lets attach this to emotions, when we feel happy we think about certain happy things, and when we are sad we think about certain sad things, because these are like state of minds with their own memories, in schezophrenia the theory is that your conscience loses access to memory of one and slips into another, and none of the memories of each are accessable, so they do not know they exist, and are like seperate minds under the same conscience, just diffrent memories.

Re:Ah, YA-thread-to-be-all-over by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:26 · Score: 0

Hmm I know what you mean, at many times, my friend was complaining about a ringing sound that was coming from a car (or something else), it was not bothering me, but it bothered him enough for him to get frustrated and tell me about it. Very interesting to hear it first hand, I've experienced the flee thing you did, but it was only for a moment, I think just about everyone has experienced the creeps and crawls after seeing a bug on their arm, or accidently walking through a spider web.

Re:Most powerful brain additive by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:31 · Score: 0

That happens some what, like if you are saying somthing or want to say something and you are interupted then you will have to remember what you were thinking, and what you were thinking was created from your memory, sometimes when you forget you must remember by remember what path you took to get there and then it usually clicks and you find what you were looking for. Retracing your steps, except you do so through your memory.

Re:Humans already are programmed =) by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:37 · Score: 0

exactly, words are just labels, much like what language words should a person use if they know 2 languages, and stuff like that.

With out the labels refrencing images sounds and many other memory and sensory, then you use them instead. Just like you can think of the word "apple", or you can imagine an apple, or even when you think of the word "red", you could be thinking of an apple.

Re:Humans already are programmed =) by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:43 · Score: 0

I find that to be wrong, in its general form. Right and wrong are of perception, for example from a persons perception the public opinion could be wrong. So moral is diffrent from person to person, there are no exact standards, and time and again people try to prove that we are individuals and that if we want to we wont conform. But if you are a politician then that statement makes more sense, as politics is usually about public opinion, that is why we vote.

Re:Programmed? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:45 · Score: 0

Sometimes its not what is good for you, but what is good for everyone, that is why there exist sacrafice.

Remembering everything wouldn't suck.. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 21:51 · Score: 0

If we were to have a memory like so many of you are describing, it would almost be impossible to function normally. You would remember many many useless things. Your brain would be filled with unimportant information like this, and it would be very cluttered.

All of this stuff about remembering too much detail getting in the way makes no sense to me.

For instance, I work in a pizza place. When someone calls and ask how much a large deluxe pizza is, the only thing that pops into my mind is $15.80. All the other details I know about large deluxe pizzas, like that they're made on a 16" crust, three scoops of sauce, 9 3/4 oz cheese, pepporoni, 2 1/2 oz onion, 2 1/2 oz green pepper, 6 oz sausage, 3 3/4 oz musrooms, what it looks like when it's done, where the boxes are that it goes in, and all the other ones I've had to make that day aren't remembered at all unless I think about them. Even if I could remember how many of them I made each day for the last two months, that information would never come into my head unless I wanted to know it.

Re:Remembering everything wouldn't suck.. by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:56 · Score: 0

Not exactly. People complain about a song they don't like that keeps playing in their head, or the times when you smell something and it triggers a memory of something that smells similar. There are times you remember something merely because it had disturbed you so much, like someone calling you a name or saying something about you to someone else, that made you mad and if you were presented with a picture of that person you would remember your anger, and if your over state of mind is OK, you will blow that anger off, or if you are mad you will be even more mad and remember what you wanted to do to the guy, or that next time you see him you will show them how much a loser they are. That kind of stuff is remember involuntarely. Your conscience does have some control, but there are times it does not, do to being in a particular emotional state.

Re:math coprocessors by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 22:01 · Score: 0

Funny you said that, when I was in elementary school and middle school, and even a little bit in high school, I was doing bad in math because I was slow, the reason I was slow was because I didn't like to memorize things like the multiplication table, I under stood and got the majority of problems correct but I was just not fast enough for those timed tests. When I got into high school, memorizing how something is done was more important then memorizing charts and such, and I did real well in complicated math because I understood it better, instead of just memorizing it. As I recall I memorized things in terms of understanding, and not just simple answer memorization, but memorizing how I got the answer, I guess this is why I have acceled at programming, algorithms, and some math concepts like DFTs FFTs and DCTs, and being able to reverse engineer back in to C some pretty complex binary executables.

Re:That report is no good by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:02 · Score: 0

Actually you probably do it and don't realize it, remember realizing it is another task. :)

What I think they are refering to is not necesarily simultanious thought, but thinking about something and then thinking about something else and then going back to what you were thinking about, people do that all the time in discussions, and sometimes people forget, but when I talk to someone I sometimes have something to say in the back of my mind but I end up discussing what they want to but I keep waiting for a perfect moment to change the topic to what I want to, but during certain parts of the conversation I will think about that thought again, and again, until I get a chance, whilst I pay attention to what they are saying. :)

Re:That report is no good by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:11 · Score: 0

I don't think so, our bodies are pretty good and the animals we have to compare to we are better in many other ways, compared to their certain better abilities. Our biggest advantage has always been the brain. The brain helps us adapt much better then any other species that we are aware of.

Our hands are not primitive, having oposable thumbs is probably our nicer features and has helped us greatly in creating and using tools.

There are people who would rather give the credit of the computer to aliens, then our own people, I find that there is no direct evidence of this and most of what has been said seems to be mostly the believers and not the thinkers. But saying this kind of stuff degrades what we are cabable of, and takes credit away from the engineers who made it possible, I'm not saying its not possible but there is no reason to believe this and destroy morality over this.

Re:walking and chewing gum multitasking? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:17 · Score: 0

Those are much more demanding tasks, its like rendering a raytraced image while trying to play a game, the games i going to be playing baddly, just like you will lose concentration in the game and or on the phone. For smaller tasks though it is very possible, such as keeping a thought fresh in your mind while talking or listening to someone else, if you don't think about the thought periodicly you could forget and then end up saying "there was something I wanted to tell you but I forgot".

Re:walking and chewing gum multitasking? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:21 · Score: 0

multiple personalities, are like multple memories, its like one personality has a section of memory while another personality has another section, if these personalities don't share their memory then that would be schizofrenia, since the diffrent personalities would not know the others exist, the personalities would change via a change of state of mind which is largely controled by emotion. Dr Jeckle and Mr Hyde. :)

Re:Brain Capabilities by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 23:47 · Score: 0

Don't ever become depressed, if you do you may go into a mind trap where all you think about is that one depressing thought, which in turn, influences other thoughts into depressing thoughts, which in turn keeps you thinking about depressing thoughts, then you become depressed, manic depressed and even suicidal, and do something as dumb as was done in Colorado.

Re:Brain Capabilities by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-16 00:02 · Score: 0

What you said about the memories is true but...

The part about saying using only 2% of our mind is a myth, I'm not so sure about that, it depends on what you mean by "we", "we" the consciences or "we" the brain? Our conscience does not use the entire brain, and rightly so, we do not want to control everything, like using our memories to control how we walk, breath, eat, etc should be handled by other parts of the brain, not our conscience.

Re:How many high order tasks can you do? by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-16 05:18 · Score: 0

Most Cognitive psychology texts I have seen mention testing skilled pianists. They get them to play new pieces on sight, and listen to conversations. They are then quizzed on the conversations. I think they even tried different conversations in each ear simultaneously.
They used skilled pianists as they felt that the hands were literally doing two seperate actions.
Some pianists were very successful at recanting the conversations. So that's three higer order tasks...!

Re:Humans already are programmed =) by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-16 10:53 · Score: 0

Okay, I feel better about it now. I was beginning to have my worries.

The thing that's always thrown me was that I am certainly able to converse with others, it just seemed as if I was spending a lot of CPU time processing the words. It's not that I speak slowly, either, or write sentences such as these at a sluggish level - it just takes up a LOT of CPU to do it.

When I'm not having to translate "think" to English, I can do quite well multitasking. I scored in the top 2% of the nation on the air traffic controller exam which I took to seek employment just after Reagan fired all the previous controllers. I didn't make the program because I didn't have enough technical skill at the time, but I could certainly juggle it all.

Which is why I figured I was still doing okay through it all.

Breathing a sigh of relief.

On Human Brains and Evolution by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-18 01:04 · Score: 0

So if we were evolved from Cats and Dogs instead
of Apes I guess I could recall your smell from
10 years ago.

Re:ADD by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-14 22:22 · Score: 1

Is there something known as the opposite of ADD? I've always been a very single-tasked person.

One of my friends says that I suffer from
'reflexive concentration'.

I can do things that envolve concentration: hypnosis,programming, etc. very well, but I suffer from information overload if I have to do more than one thing at a time well--like driving.

Attention, tasks, and lack of definitions by Anonymous Coward · 1999-05-15 16:45 · Score: 2

The poster above suggested that attention is the limiting factor in how many tasks you can perform. Not a bad start, but not quite correct.

Not all tasks require attention. For example, I bet you have no problem listening to NPR in the morning while driving to work. The route is so overlearned that attention is not neccessary. You can listen intently and still get to work safetly.

Of course, it depends on what you mean by "task". For example, my visual system alone is extracting, in parallel, millions of features from the visual field--and all without the need for attention (some researchers call this 'pre-attentive', but IMHO that is lame). So, I can perform millions of tasks at once.

Having said that, there are definite instances in which we can seemingly perform only one task at a time. So whatever you mean by task, has to be well defined. Why are some tasks easy and some hard (and require attention)? Problem signal-to-noise ratio. The more overlearned or easier the task, the higher the signal. The lower the SNR, the more likely attention will be needed.

-Anonymous Cognitive Scientist (but rarely a coward)

Re:ADD by Roland · 1999-05-14 23:25 · Score: 1

http://www.webcom.com/bmainc/welcome.html
check this out, they do som e cool, non-drug treatment that teaches out how to control brainwave patterens. I went there twice a week when I was in Highschool.

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whee -Me

Time to do some kernel hacking.......... by Jonathan+Hamilton · 1999-05-15 08:16 · Score: 1

I wonder if I can find the /usr/src/linux/include/asm/param.h file in my brain. That way I could change time scheduler to 1024 hz and run single processes faster when I'm only thinking about one thing. That would kick ass.

I think proof that we don't crash every day and see a big blue screen tells us that our brains sure as hell aren't running windows.

Re:ADD by Jordy · 1999-05-14 22:36 · Score: 1

You should really see a shrink and get checked out but, what you described is a classic example of ADD.

ADD allows a person to hyperfocus on most things are interested in. The problem is that if that person is put in a situration where there is more than one thing that requires concentration or they are not interested in a particular task, they tend to get "lost".

I personally have an appointment with a shrink to get diagnosed properly for ADD, however my mother has ADHD.. which is similar to ADD, but with hyperactivity as well as do various other people in my family.

No one quite understands how ADD works. Last I read it seemed to be more of the way you grow up rather than a genetic trait.

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The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.

Re:Sure- asperger's syndrome. by Bill+Currie · 1999-05-15 19:51 · Score: 1

However, a thought- I'm pretty good on a _bicycle_ because it requires more attention to keep it balanced and in the right place. Does anyone have opinions or experience regarding autistic/aspergers people on _motorcycles_? It only just occurred to me- it's possible that would be safer for all concerned, because a motorcycle would absolutely demand all one's attention, stick you out there in the wind with nothing between you and the road, and consequently travelling on a bike might easily result in total attention to the bike and the road and _no_ priority for interesting computer problems or whatever (my nemesis driving a comfortable automobile)

From my personal experience, I would say you're safer on a bike, but not as safe as you'ld like to think. I often find my mind latching on to other things while riding (could possibly be helped along by the route being so familiar (not many options)).

However, my mind does wander less on my bike that in a car (I also let my licence expire, with no real desire to renew it). Anyway, biking got my blood pressure down from 130/85 (not bad) to 110/75 (pretty darn good:). Probably helped me get over my recent bronchitis as quickly as I did (still a little pleghmy, but no more aches, shakes and fevers). 'Course, the anti-biotics helped too:)

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Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak

brain explosions... by Bill+Currie · 1999-05-15 20:06 · Score: 1

Ummm... religion?

More seriously: what about all those cases of insanity (I mean the real (?eh?) ones, not the political dissident ones) throughout history? I'ld think those could be classed as brain explosions.

Pertaining to my first comment, wouldn't many of you agree that (at least fundamentalistic) religion is a form of insanity and thus a case of runaway brain processes?

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Bill - aka taniwha
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Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak

Re:brain explosions... by Bill+Currie · 1999-05-15 21:27 · Score: 1

By "brain explosion" i mean drooling, twitching, spastic lack of cohesion, followed by overheating and some leakage.
Which can be mistaken for religion, except it's involuntary ;)

Umm, since when is most religion voluntary? Usually, your born into it, your parents taking you to church etc as they were. Not a lot of choice there and it takes effort to break the chain. The only voluntary religion I know of right now is free software, and judging by some slashdotters (and others), even that's debatable.
Anyway, I like your description. hmm, out the ears? or noze? (leakage) Is the lack of cohesion physical or mental (or both:). Messy.
Not to many naturally occuring instances of that version of brain explosion, though there's been plenty of induced cases. I beleive heavy club applied to the head induces the above symptoms.

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Bill - aka taniwha
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Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Re:brain explosions... by sinator · 1999-05-15 21:09 · Score: 1

At the risk of touching an inflammatory topic, the answer is NO because the key here is a voluntary belief mechanism. You choose to believe something because the argument given turns the "credible" flag on. Certain "Software" -- ie, different styles of logical/illogical methodology -- will change the sensitivity of that flag.

By "brain explosion" i mean drooling, twitching, spastic lack of cohesion, followed by overheating and some leakage.

Which can be mistaken for religion, except it's involuntary ;)

--
Three Step Plan:
1. Take over the world.
2. Get a lot of cookies.
3. Eat the cookies.

Filling all niches by Bill+Currie · 1999-05-15 20:22 · Score: 1

After reading several posts and a novel (The Star Fraction, Ken McCloud) about thoughts being virii and, in Ken's book, computers using humans to bring them to life (not well translated by me), and also remembering that astronomer's (?) comment about life expanding to fill all available niches (NOTE: Unlike said astronomer, I don't beleive that Earth is the sole source of life), I got hit by an interesting thought.(helped along by other posts about reverse engineering the brain): could whatever life-form that makes up the content's of our brains (our soul, I guess), be trying to expand it's niche from the organic world to the inorganic (eg silicon) world?

What I'm thinking is that our [I'll stick with] soul's are using our bodies to both understand themselves and produce more, different (hopefully longer lasting and more efficient) `bodies' (eg a computer or a robot).

I don't know, just a crazy idea that hit me.

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Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak

Amen by Skyshadow · 1999-05-15 04:47 · Score: 1

My mom tried to get me diagnosed with ADD when I was 17 and this whole travesty was just beginning. She made a neurologist appointment even though I told her I didn't want to go, and pretty much indicated that if I ever wanted to use the car again I should play along.

I read pretty darn fast, test extremely well and have a tremendous eye for detail, but they say there's something wrong with me because I'd rather be outside or doing something fun than working on repetative math homework.

Now, I ask you, are people with ADD the ones with the problem here? To me, it seems like this is almost genocide on a way of looking at things -- medicating you until you think like all of the rest of the good little worker ants that our society seems so intent on turning out.

Anyhow, I cheated on the computer-based test (you sit in front of the screen and click a button every time a certain shape flashes up) and so I was only diagnosed with "mild" ADD.

To all the parents out there who are thinking of medicating their ADD child: Don't. If they ever realize what you've taken from them in exchange for a few good grades in school, they'll hate you for it (and rightfully so).

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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.

Task switcher found. Do we need extra capablities? by strredwolf · 1999-05-15 06:41 · Score: 1

It looks good, but how efficent is the task switcher? Is it truly paring out the jobs efficently, or being held back due to the equipment's (ie body's) own slowness?

If it's the latter, maybe adding extra capacities (say, extra arms, eyes, or even fingers) could optimize the system. Multitasking at it's greatest. It's been proven to work, according to Anormalities and Curiosities of Medicine dating back to the 1800's. You'll need to use Project Gutenberg to find the text.

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Spammed? Click here for free slack on how to fight it!

--

--
# Canmephians for a better Linux Kernel
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.net";

The psychologist was A. R. Luria by Chris+Johnson · 1999-05-15 13:13 · Score: 1

Book is 'The Mind of a Mnemonist'.

Sure- asperger's syndrome. by Chris+Johnson · 1999-05-15 13:44 · Score: 1

I'm trying to put a little energy into this article's comments, because people are mentioning autism, but not everyone understands what it is or what they're talking about.
Asperger's is _very_ much like being single-tasked- but that's not to write it off as a deficit! It's another 'mode' of being, just like ADD (lotsa ADD advocates sounding off, I think that's pretty cool).
Someone earlier was talking about the mind's 'kernel' versus 'userland' and I thought that was a truly wonderful way of explaining what goes on with autism. In most people, the 'userland' is all over the place and can cover a lot of bases. In autistic people, the 'userland' might cover many or all of those bases, but it will do them one at a time and get stuck on them easily. It's like cooperative multitasking... _with_ the attendant advantages as well (yes, there are some if you constrain your requirements enough).
Temple Grandin, a well known and successful autistic adult, has explained it as having many deficits and liabilities but also having a 'Sun workstation' in one's head, and given the opportunity this can be a serious advantage. It's not simply being incapacitated for complex interactions like hanging out with 5 people all of whom have subtly different reactions to all the others (gah! How do you normals do this?), it's also having this weird 'black box' processor that normals don't have, and learning what it can do or helping it grow.
My own 'weird black box' has a lot to do with geometry and design (I was tested on a vocational test called the 'GATB' test and in one key part, a bit where you had to visualize what shape a flat figure could be folded into, I nailed a ten year high score on the test _and_ enjoyed the problems so much I wanted to keep doing them after the 5 minutes were up). I also have some of it devoted to English language and grammar, probably due to extensive reading :) I want it to also cover programming, but it's been very weird, as I simply cannot _comprehend_ the normal programming educational materials (it seems to jump all over the place with no center) and so I have to immerse myself in programming-related stuff and be _around_ people talking (or posting) about programming, and soak it up until a point comes when suddenly I start doing stuff that non-programmers would find completely incomprehensible (I dunno yet if it's stuff programmers would find brilliant. I'll have to wait and see...)
Driving? I haven't renewed my license, and it's been maybe five years now? I didn't get it _taken_ away from me, it just expired. Looking back, I got in too many accidents anyway so I'm not sure I _want_ to drive. Part of it certainly was drugs (I'm clean and sober at all times now and prefer that), but that's not the whole story- even when not high, I'd suffer from information overload or my brain would want to think about something else, and I hit other cars in fenderbenders. I'm happy not to drive now- it was yet another thing that I 'should' have been able to do, that _normal_ people are able to do, but reality kept tapping me on the shoulder and saying "yo! *crunch* that was a pickup truck's rear bumper, your beloved old Rabbit GTI is now toast while the truck wasn't even scratched! ...aren't you glad it wasn't a little kid in the road?" (shudder)
However, a thought- I'm pretty good on a _bicycle_ because it requires more attention to keep it balanced and in the right place. Does anyone have opinions or experience regarding autistic/aspergers people on _motorcycles_? It only just occurred to me- it's possible that would be safer for all concerned, because a motorcycle would absolutely demand all one's attention, stick you out there in the wind with nothing between you and the road, and consequently travelling on a bike might easily result in total attention to the bike and the road and _no_ priority for interesting computer problems or whatever (my nemesis driving a comfortable automobile)

Ah, YA-thread-to-be-all-over by Chris+Johnson · 1999-05-15 13:07 · Score: 2

You're thinking the more extreme forms of Kanner autism.
I'm a fellow traveler- I have Asperger's syndrome (I'm one of the many _adult_ Asperger people out there who fell through the cracks in childhood and just had to wing it)
When you read accounts from someone who's experienced this 'can't-cope' or if you've had a taste of it yourself, then it's easy to get a little more specific about what is going on. It's not really so much that the center of personality is so _weak_- what's happening is basically that the sensory input is being set nice -256 or so! o_O
(For those who haven't gotten that far, 'nice' sets priority levels, and the high negative numbers set a process to very high priority, nearly locking out everything else- another telling similarity is that userland doesn't typically get to nice processes to such levels, only root gets to set negative numbers and users are normally restrained to setting processes to _lower_ values- i.e. 'forgetting' the process and having the computer pay less attention to it!)
With that understood, it should be easier to imagine what it's like having a sensory input set to unbearably high priority. I'm not Kanner-type autistic but I _have_ had experience with this- when I was a kid we had cats (I still identify with cats powerfully) and at times they had fleas. I developed a horror of having fleas in my bed biting me when I had to sleep- and I'd end up unable to sleep whether or not there were any fleas, because _touch_ would become so intolerably acute for me that I would be feeling individual thread-ends or grains of sand, all over, with the intensity of flea bites or crawling insects (normally a much more intrusive input!)
I've seen many reports that sight and sound etc. can be this intrusive as well, so I wanted to try and clarify it a little :) 'open content', it's time for me to share some of my reality for the betterment of the community. After all, a _lot_ of Asperger people (or other stuff like ADD, see below) are hackers...

Re:How many high order tasks can you do? by gavinhall · 1999-05-15 10:02 · Score: 1

Posted by LuneKat:

I can respond to several subsatially different IM conversations and write fiction at the same time... does that count?

ps I'm working on a SF story right now that involves that multitasking ability. In the story, it is an increased memory storage capacity that allows multithreaded activities.

Programming has been done since the 60s by gavinhall · 1999-05-16 10:50 · Score: 1

Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:

The US government has known how to program people since at lease the 1960's. The perfect example is in the military. During WWII, some reports say as many as 80-90% of our service men did not fire their weapons in a combat situation. In order to overcome this the military did studies to find out why. They came to the conclusion that there was a resistance to kill other people hard wired into the human mind. What they did was train men to act automatically instead of thinking about it. The act of firing a rifle at an enemy soldier's head can't be delayed by thought. To this day the military forces of countries around the world are trained using the information collected by that research.

What can be used to overcome the resistance to kill is a trained response to a stimulus. You see the outline of an enemy soldier, you fire at it. Men are trained for weeks that when you see a foreign shape, you shoot it. No thought, no contemplation of right or wrong, just instant action. This has been done for over 30 years.

Granted this isn't low level programming, but if the point of programming is to determine behavior this is certainly a valid concern.

Do you know what MK Ultra was/is?

World governments have been interested in programming the human brain for along time.

LK

I wonder what Dennett thinks? by Paul+Crowley · 1999-05-15 01:38 · Score: 3

The philosopher Daniel C Dennett argues that many of the peculiar features of human conciousness arise because we are parallel machines trying to emulate serial ones when processing language. I guess the reason other animals don't need this part of the brain is because they only use the directly parallel solutions?
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Xenu loves you!

Do you mean Multiple Personality Disorder? by Andrej+Marjan · 1999-05-16 13:25 · Score: 1

Can you provide some references for this?
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--
Change is inevitable.
Progress is not.

Re: Megahertz and cache... by RealUlli · 1999-05-14 23:57 · Score: 2

And how much cache?

As someone else already said: about 7 objects. (Remember, the brain is *not* a simple computer!)

And I suppose there were always times I wished my own brain had more RAM. I think I've got about 2 meg myself.

I think you've a lot more than that. Just imagine going the way from your home to you school. To *any* school you ever went to. Sure, there will be parts of the way that you can't remember, but most of it is there, isn't it?

Remember the first car crash that you ever saw? Right, that is a couple of seconds of high res video!

Just add all those things up and you'll find there is quite a lot of memory, but in some parts, no easy way to access them.

On the other hand, do you remember what were the colors of the cars in the crash? You probably don't. So the event wasn't saved as straight video, but more as tokens and events. When you then think of the "super-event" (the crash) your brain renders the corresponding pictures in real time. So, probably not so much memory, but also a very fast processing unit...

Disclaimer: I'm just some hacker that thought a little about his brain... ;-)

--
Simple things should be simple, complex things should be possible.

Re:ADD by William+Tanksley · 1999-05-14 22:26 · Score: 1

"BTW, I have ADD"

Same here.

"(Why does "I've ADD" seem wrong?"

Because "I've" is short for "I have(verb)", not "I possess".

"Does anyone really understand why we talk the way we do?),"

To one extent or another. Grammar is reasonablely well explored; we have formal models of it, none of which are perfect but most of which are useful.

"and have what is supposed to be an exception...I read really well and fast and a lot, which is the opposite of the normal of ADD. Does anyone else who 'has ADD' do this?"

1000 WPM. Yes. I LOVE reading. ADD is (to say the least) not well understood.

"I'm actually pretty glad, overall, I have this 'disease'. Deep hack mode is easy"

My problem isn't deep hack mode -- it's homework. I can _easily_ spend all weekend not doing a stitch of homework, without ever leaving my book. Time passes randomly, and before I know it -- the weekend's gone. I wasn't doing anything fun, I wasn't doing anything useful; I was just staring into space. I just spent today doing that.

I like deep hack mode, but I so rarely get a chance to drop into it. I hope getting out of school removes most of this problem... I enjoy my job SO much more than my school, even though it's still a problem.

-Billy

Re:Task processor found in human brain by kashani · 1999-05-15 09:46 · Score: 1

When a computer can beat me at chess, go, pente, poker, and battleship simultaneously while discussing politics... I might get worried. The human brain is not as fast, but remains the king of multipurpose processors.

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- Why is the ninja... so deadly?

Re:Most powerful brain additive by Millennium · 1999-05-14 21:56 · Score: 2

20/20 memory? That might not be as good as you think.

I'd ask you to think of something you'd forgotten and were glad to have forgotten, but that'd be kind of pointless. However, we all have stuff like that. Things which we're better off not really remembering.

While we're at it, I'd add that 20/20 memory would mean memorizing much more sensory input than our brains are equipped to handle normally. The result: probalby something on the order of madness, paralysis, or even death the instant you tried to remember any event.

The way I'd like to see something like this run would be a "memory unit." Kind of like a Zip drive for the brain. Mmmm... downloading class notes just before the final...

This does scare me a bit, however. After all, if the brain is a computer, that means it can be programmed. And if it can be programmed, you know a virus can be written. Or worse, Billy will decide to port Windows to the brain.

Re:ADD by Svartalf · 1999-05-15 07:04 · Score: 1

I don't know if this is the same as ADD but it seems pretty close.

From someone who was also diagnosed as "hyperactive", then answer is that you didn't have what they call ADD (why in all of heaven and earth, they seem to feel the need to label it a "disorder" is beyond me...) you had ADHD. And I really hate the "drug 'em" mentality that the medical community seems to have with this- it's more of an emergent personality trait than it is a "disorder".

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I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas

"opposite of ADD?" by Doug+Merritt · 1999-05-15 10:00 · Score: 1

The standard retort is "there's no such thing as Attention Deficit 'Disorder' -- the real problem is that most people have BTS: Boredom Tolerance Syndrome".

;-)

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Professional Wild-Eyed Visionary

I hate that "it's different drug it" mentality by Odinson · 1999-05-14 23:45 · Score: 1

I was also diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, when I was screwing up in High School. I think the diagnosis was correct since my problems mostly came from being distracted by the other students games and general craziness going on around me.

Since then I've followed it a bit and I learned at least one positive and interesting thing. ADD kids often grow up to be excellent, sucessful business owners. That dosn't sound like a curse to me. Maybe it's not a disease but natural selection, a type of specialization.

It not what your delt but what you do with it.

I would definatly be curious to see if that part of the brain reacts differently in the bulk of ADD people.

Matthew Newhall

Yes! I'm in heaven!
This is nice.

--
Novel theory: Modern Man evolved from psychopath

Re:Memory span, not tasks by Crass+Spektakel · 1999-05-16 03:11 · Score: 1

>Sorry, but you've completely mis-remembered George
>Miller's research. He was researching memory span,
>not simultaneous tasking -- the two are quite
>different. Miller found that after a single
>presentation people could remember, on average,
>seven separate items, be they numbers, words, etc.

That wouldn`t be something new, I learned that ten years ago in school :-)

The brain is using tokens for it`s short- and midterm-memories. Most humans feature between four and eight, most have six tokens.
Therefore human concisness basicly comes down to the number of his tokens and their individual level of abstraction - sometimes people need two tokens for one thing where others only need one.

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"Life is short and in most cases it ends with death." Sir Sinclair

Re:Task Processor by otis+wildflower · 1999-05-16 08:57 · Score: 1

Whoa.. Scanners moment...

walking and chewing gum multitasking? by Chris+Burke · 1999-05-15 07:01 · Score: 1

I don't think that's a very good example of human multitasking. My feet know how to walk, my mouth knows how to chew gum; er, whatever portion of the brain (medula?) handles motor functions knows how. Still, there is little conscious thought involved in either action. I can even do a reasonable job of avoiding obstacles while walking and chewing gum, meanwhile being focused completely on some other task.

Multitasking, btw, doesn't necessarily mean doing two things simultaneously, at least in the strict sense. A single processor computer doesn't run tasks simultaneously, it just swaps them in and out to make sure each gets some cpu time.

Just think of talking on the phone and coding at the same time. Its not hard to do. You are liable to miss a sentence or two of the conversation, but that was the time during which coding was occupying your attention (missed interrupt?). Switch back to the conversation, and you can pick it up almost immediately (but during that time, no coding is getting done). To actually write code and carry a conversation at simultaneously without either suffering is not something I can do.

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The enemies of Democracy are

Re:walking and chewing gum multitasking? by Tardigrade · 1999-05-15 09:30 · Score: 1

More accurately, the brain is a mess of differentiated chips. You can walk, chew, and talk at the same time. It's only when you want to focus you conscious attention on more than one thing at a time that it becomes difficult. It's possible to do this, we do it all the time, but it's can be very tiring when taken to extremes, and the amount our conscious mind is able to handle is small. Most people have only one os, the rest of the brain is add-on cards (what about multiple personalities? can they consciously completely focus on more than one thing at a time, or are they merely swapping os's on the fly?).
Re:walking and chewing gum multitasking? by 13th+seer · 1999-05-15 08:58 · Score: 1

try talking on the phone while playing starcraft. it is nearly impossible for me.

Re:Memory span, not tasks by sinator · 1999-05-15 12:58 · Score: 1

That sounds reasonable. I drew a connection between first-level memory storage and simultaneous tasking (just like one could draw a connection between load averages using a processor with more cache). Muscle memory would tend to be a "hard-wired" register.

This having been said, is there any study showing how many tasks one can simultaneously perform? I posit that you can perform all you like, but what will happen if you forget about them? (let's not get into long-term storage like writing stuff down) -- I'd say that as mental efficiency approaches, the limiting factor will still be 7 + or - 2.