

Many Older Brains Have Plasticity, but in a Different Place - npalli
http://neurosciencenews.com/neuroplasticity-aging-learning-1557/

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npalli
It is fascinating to note that the changes occurred in the white matter
portion of the brain. The general thought (challenged recently) is that only
the gray/grey matter neurons 'mattered'. White matter was just conduction
between the grey matter neurons (which had all the intelligence). The final
quantity of these grey neurons was fixed shortly after birth and people kept
losing them as they aged.

If it turns out the body can recruit white matter in learning then suddenly we
have 10-50 times more cells (white matter/grey matter ratio) that can
participate in intelligence. I suspect the way intelligence is organized would
also differ between the white and grey regions. Not to mention how they
interact with each other!. It calls into question a lot of the assumptions
computational scientists make in coming up with the complexity of a simulated
brain. We might be at the start of understanding how truly complex the brain
is.

A good overview of this understudied portion of the brain is the the book "the
other brain" by douglas fields.

[http://www.amazon.com/The-Other-Brain-Breakthroughs-
Revoluti...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Other-Brain-Breakthroughs-
Revolutionize/dp/0743291425/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top)

------
MilnerRoute
I drew a lot of inspiration from a similar article by a science writer at the
New York Times (summarized in "The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain".)

[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030CVRU2/ref=as_li_tl?ie=...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030CVRU2/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B0030CVRU2&linkCode=as2&tag=destinyland-20&linkId=U7MTIS4UORQHCCV)

The basic theory is that young brains soak up experience, while older brains
consolidate it. So older brains can make bigger leaps of logic -- the old
cliche about "wiser" old people actual does have a biological basis. I wonder
if this new study is just another piece of the same phenomenon. (New memory is
stored in a different part of the brain _because_ the old plastic/learning-
storage centers have already been optimized and compressed...)

~~~
Terr_
> The basic theory is that young brains soak up experience, while older brains
> consolidate it.

It does have a certain logical appeal: The longer you live, the higher
probability that experiences (whether singly or sequences) are a repeat of
something in the past. The marginal value of experience is generally
decreasing.

------
sireat
An intriguing finding. Is there a place for non paywalled full article?

[http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2014/141119/ncomms6504/full/nco...](http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2014/141119/ncomms6504/full/ncomms6504.html)
wants money

I really do wonder how challenging the task was that there was no difference
between trained younger and older brains.

Or perhaps there was a difference between young and old trainees but that was
not the focus of the research?

Pretty much learning anything substantial is much harder later in life and
true mastery is impossible if you start after your teenage years.

Case in point: chess, where the only recent exception has been GM John Shaw
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_K._Shaw](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_K._Shaw)
who started his improvement late (at the grand old age of 19) and even then he
only got to low GM level.

