So where are they?

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A difficult quandry

In order to understand the answer to Fermi's question, you need a working model of the human mind. The search for a mind model is problematic - the closer you get to defining human thought - the more resistance you get from so-called experts. Its like no one WANTS you to figure it out! Here's my take on your subject.

The brain is made up of different (well defined) regions, that specialize in certain tasks. There's memory (hippocampus), emotions (hypothalamus), reasoning (frontal lobes), etc. I have seen many articles where today they are using CT/PET scanners while they have the subjects do a mental task. Looking at the results you can see that indeed, less than 10% of the brain is used for each task (as small regions of the brain light up). Each task would light up different regions - depending on what the task was, and the sex of the subject. So basically, you add some electricity to an area of the brain, and you get a specific result.

Making the jump from brain to mind is extremely tricky! But to make a endless story short, I chose MBTI as the mind "map". MBTI defines personality traits (NOT intelligence) into 4 binary categories. (The basis for this came from Carl Jung - a brilliant psychologist who unfortunetly played second fiddle to Sigmund Fraud - AND was a Nazi.) Instead of me explaing the entire MBTI, just look it up at http://www.keirsey.com.

OK, here's your answer. Say that you can only "power" 50% of the brain at any one time (or 10%, whatever). Which regions would you "power" and which ones would you leave "dark"? Creating a super genius would probably require powering the frontal lobes and hippocampus - leaving the hypothalamus dark. Which means that you would have a super nerd that had absolutely NO emotions (Mr. Spock!). Now what if you did the opposite? You would have a average intelligence and memory, but would have great emotional empathy! What value would you place on such a human, that could read people's feelings as if reading minds? They certainly wouldn't score high on an IQ chart, but would be a "super genius" in their own field (emotions).

THERE IS YOUR ANSWER. Those people you speak of DO EXIST. But their "IQ" is re-routed to other parts of the mind. What would a 4 sigma emotional person be like?

Posted by: Roger Ramjet   Posted on: 07/12/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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