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Oct 21, 2005

Can technology make us smarter?

Via Mind Hacks

CNET News.com interviews Mike Merzenich, a neuroscientist, on how high-tech is shaping human intelligence. Merzenich, who is also a high-tech entrepreneur, focuses on designing and developing computer applications that support cognitive skills such as memory, attention, and language processing.

 

In this interview, Merzenich claims that massive exposure to technologies such as video games, television and the Internet is affecting brain evolution. He observes that in each stage of cultural development human beings had to develop novel skills and abilities. The progressive accumulation of these skills determined significant changes in our central nervous system, which is now very different from the brain of our ancestors. As culture and technology are still evolving, the challenges faced by brains are continuously changing and elaborating. Starting from these premises, Merzenich suggests that continuous exercise can help to preserve and maintain cognitive skills and abilities, and assumes that brain fitness will be an important part of every future, well-organized life.

Read full article on News.com

More to explore

Merzenich's company Posit Science

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