First we learned that IQ tests can be culturally biased. Now it seems that lizards have been tagged with low intelligence simply because researchers failed to test them in a more species-relevant manner.
From the news release bearing this saccharine-sweet headline, Brainy Lizards Pass Test for Birds, we learn:
A Duke University experiment tested Puerto Rican anoles on several cognitive tasks and found they can learn and remember to solve a problem they’ve never faced before. The results challenge the scientific stereotype that reptiles have limited cognitive abilities and methods for finding food.
Interesting. But take a load of this loaded article lead:
Tropical lizards may be slow. But they aren’t dumb. They can do problem-solving tasks just as well as birds and mammals, a new study shows.
Ah. Just as well? That’s a stretch. What the study showed is that given . . .
“[A] wooden block with two wells, one that was empty and one that held a worm but was covered by a cap . . . . Four lizards, two male and two female, passed the test by either biting the cap or bumping it out of the way.”
Okay, that’s notable. But should we now refer to lizards as brainy problem-solvers? I don’t think so.
For years scientists and our kind in general have under-estimated, even discounted, the intellectual abilities of other, “lesser” primates. In my questioning of a new research finding — one that asserts that rhesus monkeys can experience regret — am I continuing that trend, or just being a good skeptic?
The finding:
Now a new study by Yale University researchers shows that monkeys also can be Monday morning quarterbacks and visualize alternative, hypothetical outcomes. [source]
By “Monday morning quarterbacks” the writer meant that the rhesus monkeys can recognize bad decisions in light of what would have paid off better.
How did the researchers determine this?
Lee and co-author Hiroshi Abe, in the Department of Neurobiology, recorded neuronal activity in rhesus monkeys as they played a modified game of rock-paper-scissors, receiving large juice rewards for winning games, smaller rewards for tying and nothing for losing. Monkeys were more likely in the subsequent round to pick the winning symbol in the previous game – for instance selecting paper if a rock smashed scissors. In other words, they were able to imagine a different outcome.
The Yale team also found that neural activity in the brain area known as the prefrontal cortex reflects both rational and emotional aspects of regret. One of its subdivisions is the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, an area previously implicated for other complex cognitive functions, such as working memory, and the neurons in this area signal what action would have led to a better outcome. [emphases added]
Hmm. Did the monkeys “imagine” different outcomes? Did they feel regret as we understand the term? Or is this a case of something simpler, with researchers saying “looks like a duck, must be a duck!”? Me, I think it could certainly be the case. But in all I read I did not hear a clear quack. So to speak.
Nonetheless, an interesting finding.
[recycled material - first appeared here]
While this scientific finding is not surprising, it does fill in a gap in our understanding. For years, perhaps millennia, humans have understood that drinking alcohol brings feel-good sensations. How does it do that? By releasing, at least in part, endorphins in the brain. (Endorphins are endogenous — from within — morphines.)
Author of the new study, Christina Gianoulakis, explains -
Like morphine, endogenous opioid peptides can induce analgesia and a mild euphoric effect, reduce anxiety, and may lead to a general feeling of well being. Therefore, increased release of endogenous opioid peptides in response to drinking could be partially responsible for the mild euphoric and anxiolytic effects associated with low to moderate amounts of alcoholic beverages.
As for the gap-filling material, it is this -
“One mechanism by which alcohol produces its euphoric or rewarding effects is through the stimulation of natural opioid peptides in the VTA, which consequently activates dopamine in this critical pathway,” Le said. “Until now, no one has been able to answer whether alcohol is actually capable of triggering opioid release in the VTA.”
Until now. Gap filled.
In a socially responsible manner Gianoulakis points out that the endorphin release follows only low to moderate consumption of alcohol.
After work today I may just go trigger some opioid release in my VTA. Anyone care to join me?
If you believe that you have come to your political beliefs via pure rationality — enjoy your delusion. (Excuse the bluntness.) Unfortunately, conscious logic usually comes after-the-fact, used to formalize and justify the beliefs we prefer to hold in the first place. Behind the scenes, meanwhile, we have our innate temperament, personality, parenting, culture, peers, etc., all playing a role in shaping how and what we feel and think. A recent study has in fact discovered a difference in the “brain structure” of liberals and conservatives. And no, conservatives were not found to have a larger reptilian-self-interest-lobe.
Here is what they did find:
Individuals who call themselves liberal tend to have larger anterior cingulate cortexes, while those who call themselves conservative have larger amygdalas. Based on what is known about the functions of those two brain regions, the structural differences are consistent with reports showing a greater ability of liberals to cope with conflicting information and a greater ability of conservatives to recognize a threat, the researchers say. [source]
Of course, while a link was found, we cannot assume that the difference in brain structure came first, causing the political orientation. Study after study has shown that experiences change the brain. How else would something as simple as a memory form and persist?
My guess is that there may be a bi-directional influence between brain structure and experience. Some people may come into the world, for instance, “primed” to find threats in it.
No, it’s not logical. It’s human.
This just in -
“The brain is not a sensory machine, although it often looks like one; it is a task machine,” said Amir Amedi of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “A brain area can fulfill a unique function, in this case reading, regardless of what form the sensory input takes.” [all emphases added; source]
Amedi supports that statement with the outcome of his recent research -
Brain imaging studies of blind people as they read words in Braille show activity in precisely the same part of the brain that lights up when sighted readers read.
How, I wonder, does the brain learn to “route” relevant sensory input from the fingers to the reading part of the brain? In other words, does it learn to distinguish patterned stimulation of the finger-tips, and it is the detection of the possibly meaningful pattern that “flips a switch”? Okay, this is symbolic stuff, let’s send it to the area specialized for tasks relating to meaning.
Hmm. Fascinating.
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