Narcolepsy

http://www.thailandepilepsy.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Narcolepsy.jpg

It is incredible the way in which narcolepsy could affect your life in a very negative way. Narcolepsy is a type of disorder in which you could fall asleep randomly for a short period of time at any moment. In the video we watched at school, they clearly show us the way in which narcolepsy affects a human being. Imagine if you would fall asleep while walking besides a bridge or while during a science experiment. This could cause an atrocious scene in which you could die or most probably finish injured if you don’t follow any safety precautions. Mohammad is apparently passed some bad experiences therefore he has his own safety precautions. When washing in the kitchen he uses a kind of helmet that would lessen any type of head injury. There is always someone besides him when visiting other places because Mohammad can never predict where he will fall asleep. Even though he took all this safety precautions he cannot avoid falling asleep at any moment. He can fall asleep for about sixty times a day. In some cases his body just paralyzes but he knows what is occurring around him. In my opinion I wouldn’t like to have narcolepsy because you lose allot of time falling asleep and you are very prone to any injury at every moment.

Sleep and Dreams

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Sleeping is very important for every human being, but dreaming is as important as sleeping. In the video you could notice that dreams have been the explanation for the creation of some drugs and novel prices awards. What is very interesting and unique is when we enter a stage called REM (rapid eye movement) in which your eyes start to move and your body becomes functionally paralyzed. In the video they mention a condition named REM sleep disorder that is caused by a gradual destruction in the brain stem. With the gradual destruction of the brain stem an individual will start to develop an incomplete or absent paralysis. A very interesting part of our sleeping is that we are always dreaming whether we are in REM sleep or in non-REM sleep. I totally agree when the say that our dreams are like anticipation for every day problems. In my opinion dreams are the reason for the development of our society because they've been the reason for many scientific discoveries. Another interesting part of our dreaming is that your dreams are central to the way we learn because when your dreaming you bring up new experiences that will help you to solve any problem of yours. Dreams are also a type of training because the dreams are practically preparing you for every day situations. Our life is a dream, so be prepared because everything can happen. Remember to always sleep and dream, who knows maybe you create the first time machine.

Sensory Deprivation

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The experiment that was held on sensory deprivation revealed the reactions of people's brain after taking stimuli out of their life for two days. Before the experiment took place, scientists tested the abilities of the brain of each person that was going to take the experiment. After watching there brain performance my thoughts were that they would do horrible in their brain performances after the experiment took over. During the experiment you could notice that people lost the track of time pretty fast and each of them had their own method of treating this thrilling experience. One of the woman completely lost control in just a couple of hours and was horrified throughout the hole experiment. The other woman managed to control be just sleeping throughout the entire experiment. Just like the first woman, one of the men lost their control and started to make chaos in the room. The other man managed to take over the experiment by meditating and singing. Everyone showed their unique way of reaction towards sensory depravation but after the experiment ended and they had to take again the brain test, astonishingly men did awful in the test while the women did much better than them. They found hardly difficult to answer most of the questions, but after all they were all glad when they finally got outside and saw the natural world. In conclusion, sensory deprivation could harm your brain in many ways to make you think things that don't exist and people should not use this to harm anyone.

Synthesia

1. Synesthesia

Synesthesia is a condition in which a type of sensory stimulation evokes the insight of another sense. The most common types of synesthesia are grapheme-color synesthesia and when colors are associated with the days of the week.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/578457/synesthesia

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

2. grapheme-color synesthesia

This is a form of synesthesia in which an individual experiences colors after a perception of letters and numbers.

http://dictionary.sensagent.com/grapheme–color+synesthesia/en-en/

http://annarosekerr.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/synesthesia-alphabet1.jpg

3. ordinal-linguistic personification

This is another form of synesthesia, in which ordered sequences, just like months, days, letters or ordinal numbers are associated with different types of personalities.

http://dictionary.sensagent.com/ordinal-linguistic%20personification%20%20/en-en/

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/46465000/gif/_46465226_synaesthesia466.gif

4. number-form synesthesia

This synesthesia is a mental map of numbers, in which involuntarily and automatically appears when someone with this conditions is experiencing or thinks of numbers.

http://dictionary.sensagent.com/number-form/en-en/

http://www.nature.com/nrn/journal/v6/n6/images/nrn1684-i1.gif

5. sound-color synesthesia

This type of synesthesia is when individuals would experience colors as a response to any type of music or sounds.

http://undacovabear.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/sound-colour-synesthesia/

http://www.bluecatsandchartreusekittens.com/voorkantomslag.jpg

6. lexical-gustatory synesthesia

Lexical-gustatory synesthesia is recorded as one of the most rare forms of synesthesia, in which vivid sensations of taste are evoked after spoken or written words and in some cases it includes temperature and texture

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexical-gustatory_synesthesia

http://images.sciencedaily.com/2007/12/071226003600-large.jpg

Mental Abilities: Genius, Savant and Autism

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

This is a syndrome that developes a mental or physical disability and in rare cases it developes an exceptional talent in an individual. It is an incredible phenomena that lets scientist know that the capability of the brain is extraordinary.

http://www.psy.dmu.ac.uk/drhiles/Savant%20Syndrome.htm

http://www.wisconsinmedicalsociety.org/_SAVANT/_PROFILES/kim_peek/_media/images/kimpeek_salinashospital2.jpg

2.What does genius mean? Explain the difference between genius and savant.

Genius is an incredible intelligence that a human has possesion of, usually has a very high skill in certain fields.

http://www.audioenglish.net/dictionary/genius.htm

The main difference between a savant and a genius is that savants are handicap people that develope a dissability, unlike the genius that they don't develope any disability they just develope a high intelligence.3. What is a stroke and how could it affect your mental functioning?

A stroke is also called a brain attack, in this medical emergency there is a rupture in the arteries of the brain causing a disease in the circulatory system.

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

This affects your mental functioning because when these arteries are lost they lose abilities that are controlled by the brain such as movement, speech and memory. A minor stroke will just make your arms or legs weaker while a larger stroke can leave you paralyzed.

http://www.stroke.org/site/PageServer?pagename=stroke

http://medicalimages.allrefer.com/large/stroke-series-4.jpg

4.What is a functional MRI and how does it help us understand brain activity?

It is a specialized MRI scan that measures the hemodynamic response, the change of blood flow and it scans the neural activity in the brain or spinal cords. This produces an image of the brain's metabolism of a human and even an animal

https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&biw=1273&bih=609&defl=en&q=define:Functional+MRI&sa=X&ei=XqtyTcDPOYHrgQfHkpk4&ved=0CBEQkAE

This helps us understand better the brain activity because it produces a scan of the blood flow in the brain. These scans generate maps of the human brain activity and tells us which parts of the brain are working the most during a certain activity.

http://www.pnas.org/content/89/12/5675.abstract

5. What is the corpus callosum and what role does it play

in your brain's activity?

The corpus callosum is a bundle of nerves that connects the left hemisphere of the brain to the right hemisphere of the brain.

https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&biw=1273&bih=609&defl=en&q=define:corpus+callosum&sa=X&ei=-q1yTcmlLZTfgQflnJXSAQ&ved=0CBQQkAE

Besides connecting both hemispheres an important role that the corpus callosum plays in the brain is facilitation of the interhemispheric communication and also allows both hemispheres to coordinate and communicate all their activities.

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/corpus-callosum-function.html

http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~Brainmd1/brmodelc.gif

6. What is epilepsy and how might it affect your brain's abilities?

Epilepsy is a disorder in the central part of the nervous system that causes a loss of consciousness and convulsions

http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=epilepsy&sub=Search+WordNet&o2=&o0=1&o7=&o5=&o1=1&o6=&o4=&o3=&h=0

An epilepsy could affect the brain by damaging any of the lobes. For example, if your temporal lobe is affected they your brain could suffer of memory problem, besides that if you've got epilepsy in your brain your ability concentration would be affected also.

http://www.epilepsysociety.org.uk/AboutEpilepsy/Epilepsyandyou/Universityandepilepsy/Howepilepsycanaffectlearning

7. What is autism?

Autism is a developmental disability that is caused by a brain abnormality, people with this will normally find it challenging to use their communicating skills, social skills and they will have repetitive type of behaviors.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/info/autism/

8. What is Asperger's Syndrome?

The Asperger's Syndrome is a psychiatric disorder (also called an autism spectrum disorder) that is normally appreciable at an early age; people with this syndrome will have impaired social relations and will have repetitive types of behavior.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:asperger%27s+syndrome&sa=X&ei=rtlyTfLMIomE0QHcppHFAQ&sqi=2&ved=0CCEQkAE

Accidental Genius

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Savants are people with great abilities. George is the first example in the video because he is able to recall every day of the year and makes great calculations; he even knows the populations for the states in the US. Unfortunately for him he has a great advantage but also had a great disadvantage, he wasn't able to socialize with others. George's accident occurred when he was young and stared at the rows and columns of a calendar in which he could recall the days of the next month and it was just natural for him. The difference between savants and genius is that savants are handicap, having a disability but a very high intelligence, unlike the genius that they don't have this disability. Kim Peek is another great example of a savant because he is able to memorize a book completely just after reading it and as George he can also name days of the calendar. Another case they relate to us is the case of Tommy because he had an accident because two of his arteries burst in his brain, but he was saved in a hospital. This accident revealed a compulsion towards art, something he had never done before. The case of these people has given scientists enough information to know that savants can be created from a brain injury or if they come from childhood diseases.

Make me a Genius

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/staticfiles/NGC/StaticFiles/Images/Show/37xx/374x/3740_make_me_a_genius-1_04700300.jpg

Susan Polgar, the queen of chess. Her case was very helpful to society because it lets us discover two things; genius can be made and that women are capable of doing things just as men are. Her father was capable of proving that women have also the intelligence to beat men when playing chess. He proved this by teaching her daughter techniques since she was a toddler; in such way that when she grew she would know multiple plays. This proves that her parents intervened in her genius because it was created. In the video they show us that men have a thicker cortex that helps them to have a spatial awareness, unlike women that their cortex colossal is thicker in their left side of the brain (this one lets them to solve the maze with directions). In the video they also recall the grandiose memory abilities of the waiter Vincente Santio. His memory works in the method of chunking in which he separates the parts little by little to remember from memory the orders he takes. Another case that is mentioned in the video is of Mary Ann Sieghart who suffers of face blindness. Mary finds difficult to recall a person that she sees daily because of her disease, but she does well in her editing.