Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2023 February 11

= February 11 =

Increasing brain power
Could a person’s brain power be increased if they found a way to fire every neuron in their brain at the same time? People say we only use 10% of our brains, so would firing every neuron simultaneously make someone smarter and faster? Shawn Teller (talk) 19:37, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Some people may say that we only use 10% of our brains, but they are mistaken. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 19:58, 11 February 2023 (UTC)


 * Excessive neuron firing is essentially what epilepsy does; it's not a good thing. --136.56.52.157 (talk) 21:30, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
 * But imagine what you could accomplish if the power of every single neuron was unleashed simultaneously. You would be unstoppable. Shawn Teller (talk) 02:39, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * The answer to that is not so. You would be unconscious. But to understand what an exception human brain might do, see exceptional memory, hyperthymesia, Mental calculator, Hypercalculia, Hyperlexia, Savant syndrome and Genius. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 03:28, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Neurons do not produce power, as I understand. Each gray matter neuron is estimated to consume about 2 nanowatts (Balasubramanian, 2021). If one turned off one's cortical gray matter, all else being equal, it could potentially save about 3 watts of the brain's ~20 watt power budget (if I have correctly read the numbers). I think, however, that this experiment may have some safety issues. Shells-shells (talk) 04:43, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Ten percent of the brain myth —Tamfang (talk) 22:20, 23 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Whatcha talkin' about? Donald Trump, Marjorie Taylor Greene and their ilk shut down their brains all the time. Clarityfiend (talk) 05:01, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Will you please keep partisan politics out of this??? (I could just as easily say that Barack Obama, Joe Biden and their ilk shut down their brains all the time, but I won't!) 69.181.91.208 (talk) 07:35, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * You could say it, but nobody outside the far right would believe you, whereas the antics of said Republicans are all too evident. ($5,100,000,000 for one elementary school's program?) By analogy to extraordinary claims requiring extraodinary sources, limitless idiocy begs for superhuman scorn. Clarityfiend (talk) 13:32, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * The OP geolocates to California, long known as "the land of fruits and nuts". Rather than tagging certain obvious individuals, you could generalize it to "politicians". ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:26, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Oh, so leaving thousands of Americans behind in Afghanistan to be murdered or held hostage doesn't count as terminal stupidity?! Oh, and BTW, the term "the land of fruits and nuts" applies to the far left which is dominant in California, not the so-called "far right" -- and also,  on the claim of "$5,100,000,000 for one elementary school's program"! 2601:646:8A81:6070:D84A:1762:E19D:262A (talk) 00:58, 17 February 2023 (UTC)


 * I know some people who are far more intelligent than me and far from being unstoppable they tend to be rather quiet, get married to similarly very intellgent people and live fairly simple lives. At least for the ones I know wanting to control the world just doesn't seem to be high priority ;-) NadVolum (talk) 12:25, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * To get back to the OP's question: No, it wouldn't. Brain power is a function of a lot of factors starting even in the womb, then careful and guided stimulation by parents during childhood and allowing the brain (and the person) to be shaped by regular education afterwards, including a steady dose of stimulation all the way up to adulthood. --Ouro (blah blah) 14:50, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * If you push all buttons of an elevator simultaneously, you will not reach your destination any faster, but you may survive. If all neurons of someone's brain could be made to fire at the same time, the effect would be instant death. --Lambiam 15:11, 12 February 2023 (UTC)


 * A real-life example of increasing brain power is the example of London taxi drivers, who have to learn their way around London's labyrinthine streets, "The Knowledge", which takes 3 or 4 years to master and increases the size of their hippocampus in the process. Alansplodge (talk) 17:25, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
 * If my car only burns 10% of the fuel in its tank per hour, would getting it to burn all of the fuel in its tank at once make it faster and more powerful? I suppose for certain values of "more powerful". A whole bunch of neurons in the brain firing at once is called a "seizure". To the best of my knowledge people who have suffered them have not reported greatly enhanced mental capability. --47.147.118.55 (talk) 10:14, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
 * But but, ...didn't I see Scarlett Johanson acquire superpowers after she attained 100% use of her brain in Lucy (2014 film)! 😀 NadVolum (talk) 18:15, 15 February 2023 (UTC)