Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: neuroscience

With the rise of fad diets, “superfoods,” and a growing range of dietary supplement choices, it’s sometimes hard to know what to eat.

This can be particularly relevant as we grow older and are trying to make the best choices to minimize the risk of health problems such as high blood pressure, obesity, type 2 diabetes, and heart (cardiovascular) problems.

We now have evidence these health problems also all affect brain function: they increase nerve degeneration in the brain, leading to a higher risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other brain conditions including vascular dementia and Parkinson’s disease.

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What is reality and how do we know? For many the answer is simple: What you see — hear, feel, touch, and taste — is what you get.

Your skin feels warm on a summer day because the sun exists. That apple you just tasted sweet and that left juices on your fingers, it must have existed. Our senses tell us that reality is there, and we use reason to fill in the blanks — that is, we know the sun doesn’t cease to exist at night even if we can’t see it.

But cognitive psychologist Donald Hoffman says we’re misunderstanding our relationship with objective reality. In fact, he argues that evolution has cloaked us in a perceptional virtual reality. For our own good.

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This article appears in Weekly Health Page July 31.

Researchers found that more than four out of five Ohio women who had been physically abused by their partners had suffered a head injury. A study that found domestic violence survivors had sustained staggering rates of head trauma and violent choking incidents suggests that many are left with ongoing health problems from “invisible injuries” to the brain.

But the effects of such injuries often go unrecognized by advocates, health care providers, law enforcement — even the victims themselves, researchers said.

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Finally the sisters left Percival alone to sleep, and though exhausted, he lay awake reflecting on his quest. He still had no definite sense of direction, so he prayed again for guidance, and finally trusting in the Lord to give him answer by whatever method He chose, he fell deeply asleep. He dreamt, an unusual dream in vivid color, in which he could hear water tricke and birds sing and feel the warmth of the sun on his face.

In his dream he saw an angel in a purple robe reclining against the rocks, a disturbing sight because the angel, with receding hairline and beard, wearing a white apron, held a angel figurine in a blue dress and its wings were plucked or flung out, drifting above his apron. Behind the angel was an unknown man’s shade, far to the angel’s right and above were some swords, point downwards, and to the angel’s right side, next to Percival, was a pile of jewels and crystal. The angel faced towards a cliff edge dropping off hundreds or thousands of feet, and just to the angel’s right was strung a narrow rope going past the rocks ahead, by which holding fast one might through bare toeholds and daring tenacity edge around the corner of the mountain to reach a safer ledge further on. From this line dangled a net with three fine scarves. The closest to the angel was orange, the next combined orange with green, and the third was green.

This scene flashed before his mind’s eye just long enough for him to absorb its details, and barely did he think to seek its meaning when a flash of movement caught his attention. From the suspended net, out flew a brilliantly colored bird, away from the angel and past the cliff in the direction the rope led. Like a bird of paradise, it had an orange body, green crest, and orange and green wings with a scissor-tail. A pure cascade of melodious trilling filled the morning air as it partook its free course, such that Percival felt its joy within his heart and being, and it warmed him with hope. He awoke with his heart still burning and understood through his spirit the dream, for its interpretation had also been given him and filled his mind with certainty and peace.

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Machine learning, introduced 70 years ago, is based on evidence of the dynamics of learning in the brain. Using the speed of modern computers and large datasets, deep learning algorithms have recently produced results comparable to those of human experts in various applicable fields, but with different characteristics that are distant from current knowledge of learning in neuroscience.

Using advanced experiments on neuronal cultures and large scale simulations, a group of scientists at Bar-Ilan University in Israel has demonstrated a new type of ultrafast artificial algorithms—based on the very slow dynamics—which outperform learning rates achieved to date by state-of-the-art learning algorithms.

In an article published today in the journal Scientific Reports, the researchers rebuild the bridge between neuroscience and advanced artificial intelligence algorithms that has been left virtually useless for almost 70 years.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpK_gPTdklw

Researchers have developed a soft neural implant that can be wirelessly controlled using a smartphone. It is the first wireless neural device capable of indefinitely delivering multiple drugs and multiple colour lights, which neuroscientists believe can speed up efforts to uncover brain diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, addiction, depression, and pain. A team under Professor Jae-Woong Jeong from the School of Electrical Engineering at KAIST and his collaborators have invented a device that can control neural circuits using a tiny brain implant controlled by a smartphone. The device, using Lego-like replaceable drug cartridges and powerful, low-energy Bluetooth, can target specific neurons of interest using drugs and light for prolonged periods. This study was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering.

“This novel device is the fruit of advanced electronics design and powerful micro and nanoscale engineering,” explained Professor Jeong. “We are interested in further developing this technology to make a brain implant for clinical applications.”

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