The Mind: A Miracle of Prediction
When I think of how the mind-body connection works, I reach back to half-remembered high school biology: You want to go somewhere, or stand up, or drink some water. Neurons fire in the brain and send signals down through muscles telling them what to do. Then you do it. My lasting impression is of an utterly mechanical and static process.
But I’ve come to understand that mind-body dynamics are anything but static and mechanical. They’re instead dynamic and anticipatory, like the world’s most complex simulator. Take perception. At a basic level, perception frames how we see the world through visual cues, but when we’re driving, for example, perception gives us the ability to gauge upcoming road curvature even when we can’t see it.
According to neuroscientist and engineer Alain Berthoz and some of the researchers he cites in his book The Brain’s Sense of Movement, our perception is about movement in 3-dimensional space — not just position — including predicting future movement.
I tend to think of perception as looking at and assessing fixed points, which tracks with how I learned about the human body. You see a bend up ahead on a hiking trail, so you aim for it, walk there, and then look further for the next point. Static, mechanical. But that isn’t what happens. Instead, your brain looks at the bend and uses its edge points to inform your perception about upcoming curvature that you can’t even see. Same with driving:
“1 or 2 seconds before every bend, the gaze of a driver on a mountain road becomes fixed on the tangent inside the bend. A calculation based on these data shows that the direction of this point in relation to that of the car makes it possible to predict the curvature of the road beyond the bend. In other words, the gaze of the driver is positioned on a point such that the information supplied by the optic flow allows him to predict the curvature of the trajectory.”
The point, writes Berthoz, is that the brain doesn’t just know where the car is in relation to curvature, it “seeks to predict the curvature at a future time.” The brain creates models of expectation and fills in information gaps in order to allow action to happen.
"Moyo: Muujiza wa Utabiri: ""Ninapofikiria jinsi uhusiano wa akili na mwili unavyofanya kazi, ninarudi kwenye biolojia ya shule ya sekondari: unataka kwenda mahali fulani, au kusimama, au kunywa maji." Neuroni huwasha moto katika ubongo na kutuma ishara kupitia misuli ikisema nini cha kufanya. Basi fanya hivyo. Hisia yangu ya kudumu ni ya mchakato wa kikamilifu wa mitambo na wa kimya. Lakini nimeja kuelewa kwamba nguvu za akili na mwili ni chochote ila static na mitambo. Wao ni badala ya nguvu na anticipatory, kama simulator dunia ya tata zaidi. Chukua utambuzi. Katika kiwango cha msingi, utambuzi frame jinsi sisi kuona dunia kupitia ishara ya kuona, lakini wakati sisi ni kuendesha gari, kwa mfano, utambuzi inatupa uwezo wa kupima ujao barabara curvature hata wakati hatuwezi kuona. "Kulingana na mtaalamu wa neva na mhandisi Alain Berthous na baadhi ya watafiti aliowataja katika kitabu chake ""The Brain's Sense of Movement,"" utambuzi wetu ni kuhusu mwendo katika nafasi ya 3D - sio tu nafasi - ikiwa ni pamoja na kutabiri mwendo wa baadaye." "Ninaelekea kufikiria utambuzi kama kuangalia na kutathmini ""vitu vya kudumu,"" ambayo inafuatilia jinsi nilivyojifunza juu ya mwili wa binadamu." Unapoona mwinuko mbele kwenye njia ya kutembea, unaelekea upande huo, uende huko, kisha utazame upande mwingine. Static, mitambo. Lakini si hivyo kinachotokea. Badala yake, ubongo wako unaangalia mzunguko na hutumia pointi zake za ukingo kuarifu utambuzi wako kuhusu mzunguko unaokuja ambao huwezi hata kuona. """Kama ilivyo kwa kuendesha gari, sekunde moja au mbili kabla ya kila kona, macho ya dereva kwenye barabara ya milimani huelekezwa kwenye tangent ndani ya kona." Mahesabu ya msingi wa data hizi inaonyesha kwamba mwelekeo wa hatua hii kuhusiana na kwamba ya gari inafanya kuwa inawezekana kutabiri curvature ya barabara nyuma ya curve. Kwa maneno mengine, macho ya dereva ni nafasi juu ya uhakika kama kwamba habari zinazotolewa na mtiririko wa macho inaruhusu yeye kutabiri curvature ya trajectory. uhakika ni kwamba ubongo hajui tu ambapo gari ni kuhusiana na curvature, ni "tafuta kutabiri curvature katika wakati ujao". ubongo inajenga mifano ya matarajio na kujaza katika mapungufu ya habari ili kuruhusu hatua kutokea.