“This brain could also have contained useful information”

‘Why can I say the number verbatim? Rivers of Babylon by Boney M, but does not list all the elements of the periodic table?’ wonders editor-in-chief André. Even neuroscientists cannot answer this question.

At the editorial offices of the KIJK, we process information on a daily basis. We research, record and transmit what we believe will benefit our readers. And hopefully, all of this knowledge is processed and stored in the most special instrument we possess: our brain. But research into exactly how this substance works under our cranial roof is somewhat in the doldrums. Every time “science” thinks it knows how the brain works, the brain thinks about it differently. You can read all about it in Ronald Veldhuizen’s fantastic story.

Radial keratotomy

My brain recognizes itself a lot in this story. If you wake me up in the middle of the night – which I wouldn’t advise by the way – I can say the number verbatim Rivers of Babylon by Boney M sing. (And for the record: I hate Rivers of Babylon by Boney M.) I’m just picking up the names of all the actors who have played James Bond and I can tell you that in the early 1970s a Russian invented a vision correction technique called radial keratotomy.

“There, too, could have been useful information,” I sometimes say reproachfully to my brain. Where George Lazenby’s name is now stored there could also have been the order of the planets in our solar system, or something through which I understand the math, for example, or all the elements in the array periodic.

In Ronald’s article, I read that the brain doesn’t work like that. It is not a computer in which information is stored in fixed places. Francesco Battaglia of Radboud University Nijmegen says, among other things: “It’s as if you reopen your laptop after a week and then find that all the files on your computer have been cut into pieces and scrambled.” And yet, this wonderful operating system continues to function.

Too bad the comparison with a computer doesn’t hold up, because I was secretly hoping for some kind of biological delete button with which I Yeaaaaahh, we cried, when we remembered Zion could erase. Anyway, read Ronald’s story. It’s good for your brain.

PS: If I can give you one more tip, listen to our podcast with Diederik Jekel on Kijkmagazine.nl/podcast.

This editorial is also in KIJK 4/2022, to order here.