The Unexpected Reason Facebook May Be Good For Older Adults Spending time on Facebook has been shown to reduce stress levels, slow down heart rates and -- generally speaking -- just simply relax people. Now new research suggests that learning to use Facebook may have an additional benefit for adults over 65: a sharpening of mental abilities. Janelle Wohltmann, a graduate student in the University of Arizona department of psychology, set out to see whether teaching older adults to use the popular social networking site could give a boost to their cognitive performance and make them feel more socially connected. Her preliminary findings, which she shared this month at the International Neuropsychological Society Annual Meeting in Hawaii, reveal that older adults, after learning to use Facebook, performed about 25 percent better on memory tasks. During her study, Wohltmann helped train 14 older adults who had never before -- or who had rarely used -- Facebook so that they ultimately amassed new online friends while posting daily on the site.
Why People Think Computers Can't WHY PEOPLE THINK COMPUTERS CAN'T Marvin Minsky, MIT First published in AI Magazine, vol. 3 no. 4, Fall 1982. Reprinted in Technology Review, Nov/Dec 1983, and in The Computer Culture, (Donnelly, Ed.) Associated Univ. Presses, Cranbury NJ, 1985 Most people think computers will never be able to think. That is, really think. Not now or ever. Creating False Memories Elizabeth F. Loftus In 1986 Nadean Cool, a nurse's aide in Wisconsin, sought therapy from a psychiatrist to help her cope with her reaction to a traumatic event experienced by her daughter. During therapy, the psychiatrist used hypnosis and other suggestive techniques to dig out buried memories of abuse that Cool herself had allegedly experienced. In the process, Cool became convinced that she had repressed memories of having been in a satanic cult, of eating babies, of being raped, of having sex with animals and of being forced to watch the murder of her eight-year-old friend. When Cool finally realized that false memories had been planted, she sued the psychiatrist for malpractice. In all four cases, the women developed memories about childhood abuse in therapy and then later denied their authenticity. My own research into memory distortion goes back to the early 1970s, when I began studies of the "misinformation effect." False Childhood Memories My research associate, Jacqueline E.
Level 3 Of Consciousness Meme Central Books Level 3 Resources Richard Brodie Virus of the Mind What’s New? Site Map Level 3 of Consciousness You are reading about something that most people don’t even know exists. 1. Sometimes like attracts like and sometimes opposite attracts opposite. When like attracts like, it can end there, like an oxygen molecule made up of two oxygen atoms, or it can continue to attract like, like a Carbon atom. 2. Sometimes a self-replicating thing makes a copy of itself with a mistake in it. The only way for new things to get created is by a complex series of mistakes that turn out to be better after all. 3. 4. 5. 6. Self-replication is the most powerful force in the universe. Sometimes a self-replicating memeplex makes a mistake in copying itself. The only way for a new idea to gain acceptance is by a series of copying mistakes that turn out to be better after all. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. The battle can be influenced in three ways. 12. 13. Life is largely composed of conversations. 14.
Seeing in the Dark Credit: cliff1066tm. Patient TN was, by his own account, completely blind. Two consecutive strokes had destroyed the visual cortex of his brain, and consequently, his ability to see. It is not uncommon for stroke patients to suffer brain damage, but the case of TN — referenced by his initials, the general practice in such studies — was peculiar. His first stroke had injured only one hemisphere of his visual cortex. About five weeks later, a second stroke damaged the other hemisphere. Known as selective bilateral occipital damage, TN’s unusual injury made him the subject of much interest while recovering at a hospital in Geneva. To further test the extent of TN’s abilities, researchers from Tilburg University in the Netherlands devised a simple yet decisive experiment: an obstacle course. TN’s rare condition is known as blindsight. The researchers explained that TN’s success indicates that “humans can sustain sophisticated visuo-spacial skills in the absence of perceptual awareness.”
The Chinese Room Argument 1. Overview Work in Artificial Intelligence (AI) has produced computer programs that can beat the world chess champion and defeat the best human players on the television quiz show Jeopardy. Searle argues that a good way to test a theory of mind, say a theory that holds that understanding can be created by doing such and such, is to imagine what it would be like to do what the theory says would create understanding. Imagine a native English speaker who knows no Chinese locked in a room full of boxes of Chinese symbols (a data base) together with a book of instructions for manipulating the symbols (the program). Searle goes on to say, “The point of the argument is this: if the man in the room does not understand Chinese on the basis of implementing the appropriate program for understanding Chinese then neither does any other digital computer solely on that basis because no computer, qua computer, has anything the man does not have.” 2. 2.1 Leibniz’ Mill 17. 2.2 Turing's Paper Machine 3. 4.
Scientists capture the first image of memories being made The ability to learn and to establish new memories is essential to our daily existence and identity; enabling us to navigate through the world. A new study by researchers at the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital (The Neuro), McGill University and University of California, Los Angeles has captured an image for the first time of a mechanism, specifically protein translation, which underlies long-term memory formation. The finding provides the first visual evidence that when a new memory is formed new proteins are made locally at the synapse - the connection between nerve cells - increasing the strength of the synaptic connection and reinforcing the memory. The study published in Science, is important for understanding how memory traces are created and the ability to monitor it in real time will allow a detailed understanding of how memories are formed. (Photo Credit: Science)
The Turing Test First published Wed Apr 9, 2003; substantive revision Wed Jan 26, 2011 The phrase “The Turing Test” is most properly used to refer to a proposal made by Turing (1950) as a way of dealing with the question whether machines can think. According to Turing, the question whether machines can think is itself “too meaningless” to deserve discussion (442). However, if we consider the more precise—and somehow related—question whether a digital computer can do well in a certain kind of game that Turing describes (“The Imitation Game”), then—at least in Turing's eyes—we do have a question that admits of precise discussion. The phrase “The Turing Test” is sometimes used more generally to refer to some kinds of behavioural tests for the presence of mind, or thought, or intelligence in putatively minded entities. The subsequent discussion takes up the preceding ideas in the order in which they have been introduced. 1. Turing (1950) describes the following kind of game. 2.
The biology of dreaming o one would normally consider David Maurice, Ph.D., professor of ocular physiology in the Department of Ophthalmology at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, a revolutionary. Nevertheless, he has reignited a decades-long controversy that could spark a revolutionary re-evaluation of an entire field of behavioral research. Dr. Maurice has developed a startling new line of scientific inquiry that, when added to other findings, could change our understanding of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and the nature of dreams. What Maurice has done is to suggest an alternative explanation for the phenomenon known as REM sleep, the stage in which the eyes rapidly move and most dreams occur. "Without REM," Maurice told 21stC, "our corneas would starve and suffocate while we are asleep with our eyes closed." Maurice's interest in REM began a few years ago. "What is at stake here is a theory of dreams that is scientifically valid," Dr. Interpretation vs. observation Drs. No final answer in sight Neil B.