One example would be pain. Research published in the Journal of Neuroscience found that when people didn’t know how much a painful heat stimulus would hurt — when they watched a group of others who disagreed wildly about it — they felt more pain than when the group agreed. The heat itself didn’t change. Only the uncertainty did. That single finding opens a door onto something much bigger: the way the brain interprets incoming signals doesn’t just affect physical pain. In fact, it shapes every experience, every emotion, and every belief we form about the world around us.

The Brain Is a Prediction Machine, Not a Camera

Your brain doesn’t work like a camera, passively recording what’s in front of it. It works more like a detective — making its best guess about what’s happening based on past experience, context, and whatever signals it can pick up in the moment. In fact, this is the way AI works the same way because it guesses what you intend when you are dictating to it. That’s based on what you have known to use before. It’s not original; it’s from something you’ve already said or thought.

Scientists call this predictive processing. Fancy words for something that’s simple. The brain is constantly generating a model of reality and checking it against what the senses report. Most of what you experience isn’t raw sensory data. It’s the brain’s best guess, already processed and interpreted before you’re even aware of it.

This has enormous consequences. Because your brain fills in gaps with guesses, your perception of any situation is shaped as much by what you expect as by what’s actually there. Research on how emotions are built in the brain confirms this same pattern. Feelings aren’t simple, automatic reactions that arise out of nowhere. They’re constructed — assembled by the brain from past learning, bodily signals, and whatever the surrounding context suggests is happening — all woven together into something that feels completely immediate and real. Fear, hope, dread, excitement — none of these are just responses to the world. They’re interpretations. And like all interpretations, they can be mistaken.

This might be unsettling to hear. But it’s also genuinely freeing, because it means your perception of reality isn’t fixed. It can be trained.

The Brain’s Thumb on the Scale

Here’s the catch. The brain doesn’t interpret experiences evenly. It has a strong, built-in bias toward the negative. This explains why negative information is so strongly entrenched in our minds. Negative information is stored more vividly in memory and carries more weight in the decisions we make than equivalent positive information does. This isn’t a character flaw. It’s an evolutionary feature.

Our ancestors survived by treating ambiguous situations as dangerous — if a rustle in the bushes might be a predator, it was safer to assume the worst and run. The cost of a false alarm was low; the cost of missing a real threat could be fatal.

In modern life, that same wiring creates serious problems. We’re exposed to more alarming information than any previous generation — not necessarily because the world is more dangerous, but because we carry a device in our pockets that streams us the worst of humanity around the clock. Research on how news consumption affects perception found that a steady diet of threatening content actively cultivates a distorted view of the world, pushing people to overestimate danger (The Scary World Syndrome) and feel a constant sense of impending doom that doesn’t match their actual circumstances.

In one study on risk perception during a health crisis, people overestimated their personal risk of dying from a disease by more than 270 times the actual probability. Their brains weren’t computing risk. They were amplifying fear.

Uncertainty makes all of this worse. Much worse. The same research that revealed how uncertainty increases physical pain also showed that not knowing what to expect activates a specific brain region — one that amplifies the intensity of an experience, for better or worse. And this effect isn’t limited to physical sensation.

Research on stress and health outcomes has found that the threat of losing a job can actually be more damaging to physical health than losing it outright, because the brain treats an uncertain threat as something to brace against continuously — a draining, exhausting posture that takes a real toll on the body over time. Sounds like burnout, doesn’t it? It isn’t just pain that uncertainty turns up. It’s almost everything the brain interprets as potentially threatening, which, given the negativity bias, covers a whole lot of ground.

What makes this particularly important in today’s world is that this feedback loop isn’t passive. The beliefs we form — shaped by perception, fear, and repeated exposure to alarming information — circle back and filter what we’re willing to notice next.

Research on how beliefs affect the brain’s processing of sensory information suggests that what we expect to see and feel actually controls what reaches our conscious awareness. Our beliefs aren’t just conclusions we reach. They become part of the filter that determines what evidence the brain even considers. This is like throwing the wheat away with the chaff.

What You Can Actually Do About It

Understanding how the brain constructs experience isn’t just interesting. It points directly to what we can do differently.

The first step is recognizing that your interpretation of a situation isn’t the same thing as the situation itself. When you feel dread about a conversation you haven’t had yet or are certain something’s going to go wrong, your brain is filling in a gap with a guess — shaped by past experience, current stress, and the negativity bias — not delivering a reliable preview of the future. That awareness alone, when you can genuinely hold onto it, changes your relationship with the feeling. You don’t have to argue with it or push it away. You just don’t have to treat it as truth.

The second step involves what you feed your brain. Because the brain builds its models of the world out of the patterns it encounters most often, the information environment you live in genuinely shapes how you perceive things — including things that have nothing directly to do with that environment. Heavy exposure to alarming content trains the brain to scan for threats even in neutral situations. Seeking out different perspectives, sitting with ambiguity instead of rushing to resolve it, and spending time in environments where uncertainty is met with curiosity rather than alarm — these gradually reshape the models your brain is running.

The third step is learning to treat uncertainty itself differently. That’s harder than it sounds, because not knowing really activates stress responses that narrow attention and make everything feel more urgent and more threatening. But evidence consistently shows that people who can stay open when they don’t know what’s coming — who can resist the pull toward premature conclusions — think more flexibly, solve problems more creatively, and make sounder decisions. The ability to hold more than one interpretation in mind at once isn’t a fixed personality trait. Like any other cognitive skill, it responds to practice.

None of this is an argument for forced optimism or pretending that hard things aren’t hard. Negative emotions carry real information and serve genuine purposes when they’re in proportion to what’s actually happening. The goal isn’t to replace one distortion with another. It’s important to notice when the brain’s interpretive machinery is running hot — turning not-knowing into catastrophe, amplifying uncertainty into doom — and to remember that what feels like reality is always, to some degree, something the brain has made.

The world you live in isn’t the world as it is. It’s the world your brain has built for you, piece by piece, out of everything it expects, fears, and has learned to look for. That’s not a reason for despair. Actually, it’s an invitation to get curious about the builder — and to ask whether the story it’s been telling you still has to be the only one.

The post Reality Isn’t What You Think: It’s How Your Brain Builds Everything appeared first on Medika Life.

Pharmaceutical companies have given us a great deal of information sometimes causing confusion when we think about neurotransmitters. But, outside of pharmaceuticals, there is another way we can help ourselves to better health. Exercise is one way researchers have discovered we have influence over crucial neurotransmitters.

Whoever thought that exercise could have such dramatic effects on our ability to maintain brain health? Well, the jury is in on that one, and the gains are impressive—gains that we cannot ignore. The good news is that you don’t have to exercise to exhaustion to reap the benefits. But it’s not simply one hormone, dopamine, that is in play here, which can mean gains for all of us.

Of course, dopamine is a complex hormone-neurotransmitter of interest. Exercising raises levels of this hormone associated with motivation, pleasure, and contentment. New research shows a possible link between better reflexes and dopamine levels when exercising. In 1979, researchers found the good news about dopamine and reflexes when they observed older lab rats and their swimming abilities. Once the older rats got the biosynthetic precursor of dopamine, L-dopa, their swimming ability and endurance increased.

As people live longer, and with the risk of Alzheimer’s disease affecting their cognition, it’s crucial to find ways to prevent cognitive impairments. Despite researchers’ best efforts, traditional methods for developing effective treatments have mostly been unsuccessful. Curiously, research has shown that exercise, particularly endurance exercise, can boost cognitive function as we age and has positive benefits in brain health generally.

The hippocampus, which helps with memory recall and recognition, can be modified in young adults through aerobic exercise. A three-month intervention examined whether healthy older persons (60–77 years) also exhibit such flexibility. Researchers have observed a correlation between cognition and exercise in persons in their twenties and thirties, suggesting that it persists into old age. The results? Improvements in fitness were positively associated with improvements in early spatial object recognition and memory.

This research on aerobic exercise and cognition also noted one caveat of concern. As people get older, the benefits of exercise on the brain seem to decrease. This is especially true for the hippocampus, a critical part of the brain.

We need to consider, however, that many intervening variables were not accounted for in this research and may play a major role in older persons’ cognitive processes benefiting from exercise. Of course, genetic inheritance, diet, and lifestyle are always issues that need to be considered and may contribute, either minutely or massively, to changes that may come about after these exercise protocols.

One thing we must note is that exercise is always a good idea, and we should not write it off because of one research project. Just because one research study produced an interesting result doesn’t mean it applies to everyone.

But what about the hormone irisin that is involved in both exercise and body fat? A slight increase in irisin levels can improve insulin resistance caused by a diet. This hormone can help muscles function better by affecting fat. And there is much more evidence for the involvement of irisin as well as in body fat—white versus brown fat.

Another interesting finding of research on irisin is that it can contain neuroinflammation, which has been thought to be involved in the development of Alzheimer’s disease. In fact, neuroinflammation has been viewed as the major killer of brain neurons as we age.

To date, all of this research is bringing new attention to the complex relationships in our bodies. The intricate muscle-fat-bone axis now includes skeletal muscle, which is thought of as an endocrine organ that secretes irisin. This may be a little–known hormone that has a major effect on our body overall.

Developments in the understanding of the skeleton’s role as an endocrine organ in glucose tolerance and testosterone production through the secretion of a bone-specific protein are encouraging. Now that bone-skeletal muscle is officially recognized as an endocrine “gland,” the therapeutic possibilities for this hormone-secreting tissue are endless.

The main point is that exercising regularly is crucial for our health and mental abilities as we grow older, and we are only now beginning to fully appreciate its importance. The overall maintenance of our bodies goes beyond just keeping our muscles in shape. Anyone who can sit in a chair can exercise. Don’t believe it? Go to YouTube and watch this video.

The post The Hormones That Get Too Little Attention and Bring Big Benefits appeared first on Medika Life.

Human brain organoids (HBOs) are made in a lab from human stem cells and look and work like parts of the brain. Since it is clearly impossible to study living humans, scientists have been using animal models and cultured neuronal cells to discern how diseases work. However, these methods still have important differences with real brains, such as how they are organized in three dimensions and differences between species, making it hard to study how the higher brain works. These problems can be addressed in a new way with HBO.

In addition to stem cells, researchers have discovered a new source of research material, one that had never been considered in the past; amniotic fluid. During pregnancy, a baby sheds cells into the amniotic fluid surrounding and protecting it.

As a baby grows inside the womb, these cells mix with the amniotic fluid. Now, scientists have shown that they can use those cells to make organoids, which are three-dimensional structures that look and work like human organs. In one case, the organoids were the kidneys, small intestines, and lungs. Organoids might help physicians learn more about how fetal organs are growing, which could lead to earlier detection of birth defects like spina bifida.

It is not the first time organoids have been made from baby cells. Other groups have grown them from baby tissue that was thrown away. But this group is one of the first to make organoids from cells taken from amniotic fluid.

The idea is innovative, and organoids made from fetal fluid have shown it to work. But there is still room for improvement in how you describe the cells that are there.

For many years, scientists have known that fetus cells are in the amniotic fluid. With amniocentesis, a needle is used to take a sample of the fluid. This lets physicians discern conditions like Down syndrome and sickle-cell disease before the baby is born. At least 95% of these cells the baby is shedding are dead.

Organoids made from baby cells have been made before. Other groups have grown them from leftover fetal tissue. On the other hand, one group is the first to make organoids from cells taken from amniotic fluid. It does not affect the baby.

Most people have heard of mini-brains, which are groups of neurons meant to fire in a way similar to how cells fire in a real brain, but not quite. There have been heated arguments about whether these tiny blobs could ever be aware, feel pain, or think, and whether they should even be called “mini-brains” because they differ from a fully developed human brain.

In another area, thyroid disease, a breakthrough may benefit those who suffer from thyroid disease. One study group working on thyroid cells has successfully used stem cells to make tiny thyroids that can be transplanted into mice, but not humans yet.

Hypothyroidism, or an underactive thyroid, affects about 5% of people and can cause tiredness, aches and pains, weight gain, and sadness. It can also change the way children’s brains grow. And people who have it often have to take a treatment every day to replace their hormones. This team’s efforts resulted in getting mice to make thyroid hormones again, which opened the door for humans. About which therapies will work with cancer, there is hope there, too, derived from studies of organoids.

Patient-derived organoids (PDOs) are new and strong pre-clinical models. However, it is still not clear how well they can predict how patients will do in the clinic. What effects will certain treatments have on a patient’s cancer? Organoids made from patients did help predict how well treatment would work for metastatic gastrointestinal cancers.

Researchers also use organoids to study how the host and bacteria interact. Adding immune system parts to infected organoids would be the next step in this direction. A few methods using triple co-cultures have been created, most of which try to replicate harmful illnesses with viruses or bacteria. In all these important research findings, one consideration must be in the mix; ethics with animal brain organoids and simple organoids in dishes.

Until now, these human brain organoids have only been found in test tubes. The most advanced ones are about the size of a pea and pulse with the electrical activity that makes real brains work. In a way that is similar to brains, they make new neurons. They also build the six layers of the human cortex, which is where thinking, speaking, making decisions, and other complex cognitive processes happen.

Many experts in the field do not think an organoid in a dish can think, but we need to talk about this. While we are discovering new ways to combat illness and developmental issues through the use of these organoids, we are also faced with ethical issues all along the way. Each of these issues must be addressed in a way that will benefit everyone and not inhibit the growth of science in its quest for health.

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Dementia has long been linked to the loss of cognitive capacities. Meanwhile, recent research has discovered a fascinating phenomenon: some people with particular types of dementia display startling bursts of creativity. Both scientists and artists are now examining the complex relationship between the two in light of the unexpected link between cognitive decline and creativity.

Memory loss and cognitive decline that determine a person’s identity have historically been seen as negative effects of dementia. Memory loss and cognitive impairment are two features that frequently characterize Alzheimer’s disease, the most prevalent type of dementia. Nonetheless, some people with Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias related to it have demonstrated artistic aptitude and creative talents that seem to get better as their cognitive functions decline. These new abilities appear to have emerged at the beginning of the disorder.

Formerly called Pick’s Disease, this dementia brings about changes in brain connections, which, according to researchers, may be the cause of this contradictory association between dementia and creativity. A novel and inventive concept may arise as certain neural routes fail, possibly opening up new, less common neural pathways. This may help to explain why some people who may not have previously shown an aptitude for the arts suddenly demonstrate it through their writing, singing, or other creative endeavors. The brain appears to respond to destruction in a manner unthought of previously, and it apparently releases new areas to work unlike before.

The famed abstract expressionist artist Willem de Kooning is one of the best-known examples of creativity coming back from dementia. In his later years, De Kooning received a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease, but he still created amazing works of art despite his cognitive impairment. Similar instances of people with dementia making complex visual art, composing music, and recounting stories on the spot have been reported.

Vincent van Gogh may have been afflicted with this form of dementia, and here the speculation about age, dementia, and creativity merge if not sufficiently, to raise our curiosity. The protective factor of creativity is one of the more interesting aspects of how the brain might react to some intrusion bringing about mental change. It is a gain of function in a time of neurodegeneration, and that seems more than unusual.

Another example of this type of dementia-driven creativity can be found in the work of Ravel. One melodic clause appears again in his piece “Boléro,” which lasts fifteen minutes. This repetitive behavior may be a sign of FTD patients’ tendency toward obsessive repetition.

First discovered by Bruce Miller at a VA in California, the disease is related to which side of the brain is being attacked and its abilities diminished. In one study of people with FTD, the left temporal lobe had gotten worse, but at the same time, areas of the brain involved in processing visual information had become overactive. Researchers are now beginning to study this unusual creativity of dementia and the normal brains of creative people.

The complexity of the human brain can be better understood by understanding this phenomenon, which also has implications for treatment methods. Participating in artistic activities with people who have dementia may improve their quality of life by giving them a way to express themselves and a way to cope with the frustrations of cognitive loss. Sometimes, this creative ability may appear when speech is lost as in the case of the biologist Anne Adams. To activate these dormant creative capacities, dementia care has already investigated art therapy and other creative approaches.

The surprisingly high level of creativity linked to some forms of dementia has shown the complex link between cognitive decline and artistic expression. By highlighting the potential for creative growth even in the context of neurological diseases, this phenomenon contradicts traditional ideas of dementia as only a degenerative condition.

Investigating this link advances our knowledge of the human brain and creates opportunities for cutting-edge therapeutic strategies. We are still wandering in the vast and highly secretive forest of the brain, and, thus far, the roads we have found have revealed unexpected opportunities for treatments far afield from what we usually prescribe.

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Obesity is a significant public health issue that affects people of all ages, genders, and socioeconomic backgrounds. The World Health Organization (WHO) states that over one billion people worldwide are obese. This estimate includes 650 million adults, 340 million adolescents, and 39 million children.

The World Health Organization explains that obesity impacts most body systems, including the heart, liver, kidneys, joints, and reproductive system. It can lead to various non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, stroke, cancer, and mental health issues. Individuals with obesity are three times more likely to be hospitalized for COVID-19.

Now comes a brain imaging study that analyzed brain differences between females and males with a high body mass index (compared with those with a normal BMI).

Obesity — Men and women have different brains

The University of California, Los Angeles (USA) researchers analyzed data from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, clinical characteristics, and medical histories. They aimed to identify sex-specific brain processes that lead to obesity. Might men and women develop obesity for different reasons?

Historical studies examined brain images to see how obesity affects eating habits. Few studies have looked to see how the brains of obese individuals might differ in males and females.

Here are the current study results:

Specific brain parts differed between males and females with a high body mass index (BMI). The researchers offer that tailoring management to an individual’s sex may be essential to combating obesity.

In other words, investigating sex as a biological variable is key to determining obesity development and management response.

Obesity — Study details

The study involved a review of data from 183 participants. Of these, 78 had a high body mass index, and 105 had a normal BMI. The researchers used several brain scan forms. They also collected survey data on early life experiences, mood, and eating habits.

Using a method known as DIABLO, the scientists tried to accurately discern differences between those with a high versus a normal BMI. They also assessed differences between males and females with high BMI.

The analysis could effectively differentiate high BMI from normal BMI participants with 77 percent accuracy. Also, males with high body mass indexes could be distinguished from females with high BMI with 75 percent accuracy.

The study discovered differences in specific brain regions when comparing males and females. These variations appeared to be related to mental health, early life experiences, and touch sense.

Women with obesity exhibited changes in emotion-related brain centers associated with higher compulsive eating levels. On the other hand, in men, brain regions related to eating behavior and obesity were linked to gut sensations linked to abdominal discomfort and hunger.

Moreover, women with a high BMI had more significant brain signatures and lower mental health scores than men. Females may be more vulnerable to developing food cravings and addictions.

My take — Obesity and sex differences in the brain

This exploration of sex differences is unusual; of 199 studies found by the researchers, only 13 examined sex differences.

Key brain signatures are changed in obese individuals, affecting how an individual views food (and food cravings), eating patterns, and obesity. By looking at how these brain patterns differ by sex, the researchers open the door to a better understanding of the pathways by which women and men develop obesity.

In summary, there are gender differences in obesity. The reasons for the variation are unclear. By better understanding how the brains of those with obesity differ from those without it, we may develop better diagnostic and management tools.

Because the study was cross-sectional (comparing one group to another), the researchers cannot establish any causal relationships. We do not know if the brain MRI differences between men and women, based on body mass index, are due to gender or BMI. There may be some other factors.

Second, the researchers could have used more accurate measures of obesity, including waist-hip ratio or fat measurements (visceral adiposity).

Finally, I don’t think this provocative study has any implications for the current management of obesity. Given that those with a higher BMI report significantly greater childhood traumas, anxiety, depression, a tendency to notice body symptoms with hypervigilance, and other chronic stressors, we need to do a better job addressing these issues.

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Today we learn how that substance — cerebrospinal fluid or CSF — washes in and out of our brain tissues in waves, helping to remove waste products. The cerebrospinal spinal fluid also bathes our brain with proteins or growth factors, facilitating normal development.

Decay theory of memory fading

When we learn something new, we create a neurochemical memory trace. The decay theory posits that our memory fades secondary to the passage of time, with information becoming less available for later retrieval as time goes by; the memory strength simply wears away.

Columbia University (USA) psychologist Edward Thorndike first coined the descriptor “decay theory” in The Psychology of Learning in 1914. Active rehearsal of the information can counteract the memory fading.

Memories fade like old photographs

Why do our memories, like old photographs, fade in quality over time? Not only do our recollections become less accurate over time, but we also experience decreases vibrancy and other visual qualities.

Are you like me? I sometimes have a memory that feels like I am reliving the moment. On other occasions, the details are remarkably fuzzy. An example of the former? After I had an emotionally significant event, getting engaged at New York’s Rainbow Room at Rockefeller Center, I have a good recall of the event, but everything has faded in my mind.

As events are forgotten or stored in memory, Boston College researchers wondered how their visual features evolve? Study participants reported changes in their memories akin to using a filter to edit a photograph on Instagram.

The researchers went a step further, inquiring if forgetting is similar to applying a filter to our experiences and whether the emotional significance of the event would change which filter we apply.

Here are the findings, as detailed by study author Rose Cooper:

“Memories seem to fade literally: people consistently remembered visual scenes as being less vibrant than originally experienced.” She continues, adding, “we had expected that memories would get less accurate after a delay, but we did not expect that there would be this qualitative shift in the way that they remembered them.”

Furthermore, negative emotions study participants experienced when viewing images raised the chances that they would accurately recall the images but did not influence memory fading.

In summary, the researchers discovered that the vibrancy of low-level details — colors and shapes, for example — fades in memory while we keep the general gist of the experience.

The fading appeared less for memories subjectively rated as more robust. Emotional memories did not influence the fading amount but did impact the likelihood with which the subjects remembered an exposure. My Rainbow is recalled, but not vividly.

What drives the memory fading? Do we forget over time, or is new material interfering with new information?

Cerebrospinal fluid basics

Researchers recently reversed memory loss in mice by injecting them with a brain fluid from younger peers. First, let’s take a quick look at that fluid, or cerebrospinal fluid (CSF).

The CSF is a body fluid surrounding the brain and cushion in the skull. Maiken Nedergaard and colleagues discovered that cerebrospinal fluid also acts as a lymph system in the brain.

Via a series of elegant experiments analyzing mice brains, the researchers visualized cerebrospinal fluid entering and flowing through the brain, ultimately draining into the same ducts used by the lymphatic system of the rest of the body.

The cerebrospinal fluid clears harmful amyloid-beta from the brain. The substance is associated with Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions. While Nedergaard and co-investigators honed in on this protein, other leftover proteins are likely also removed.

In summary, cerebrospinal (spinal) fluid washes in and out of the crevices of our brains in waves. The process is central to waste removal.

Reversing memory loss in mice

Researchers reversed memory loss by injecting cerebrospinal fluid from younger mice peers.

Using a tiny tube and pump, the scientists infused cerebrospinal fluid from young adult mice into the brains of 18-month-old animals — the equivalent to about 60 years for humans — over seven days.

Imaging revealed higher levels of myelin, a fatty sheath that covers and protects nerve cells from damage. The injections led to practical changes, too: The elderly mice improved at a fear-conditioning task. The refreshed mice remembered a tone, and a flashing light meant a small electric shock was coming.

Growth factors and memory rejuvenation

Growth factors that can restore nerve cell function are the likely agents of memory improvement. Stimulated cells — oligodendrocytes — made more myelin, creating stronger connections between the nerve cells.

Genes normally expressed in oligodendrocytes appeared revved up or upregulated in the old mice who had received cerebrospinal fluid from young mice.

The researchers also found changes in gene expression in a structure important for memory, the hippocampus. The gene Fgf17 decreases activity with age; the CSF infusion restored function.

This research is stunning. With all of the troubles in the world, it is heartening to see brilliant scientists opening doors to a future where we may be able to improve memory. It is also disturbing. I hope we someday don’t go down this road; gene editing sounds much more appealing to me, especially for those with dementia.

Until we get a drug targeting memory in humans, I will continue to focus on a healthy diet, adequate sleep, regular physical activity, limiting alcohol consumption, and challenging my brain with activities such as my new Haydn Piano Sonatas.

The post Can We Reverse Memory Loss with Brain Liquid From Younger Folks? appeared first on Medika Life.

Just as a computer (modeled on our neural networks) needs to defrag to get rid of junk files and restore order to the computer’s hard drive, our brain goes through a similar process. The primary work appears to be accomplished at night during sleep, and there are new-found brain organizers dedicated to that task.

In fact, scientists are discovering new bits of the brain and the body they never knew existed before. One, of course, was the brain’s “hidden” plumbing system that gets rid of the garbage as we sleep, memory formation, immune system related to obesity, t-cells that target cancer, a “hidden” muscle in the jaw, and more to come. Special cells in the brain that facilitate learning networks might also clear out unused or unstable networks. No one knows for sure.

In fact, recent research has indicated these same cells that promote learning work in reverse and clear our brain. These microglia cells are now viewed as the “brain’s sculptors” that are vigilant and working constantly.

But their pruning activity may go awry, as seen in schizophrenia and autism. What signals them to go either way? There may be special protective materials that are deficient in some brains. Perhaps abnormal forgetting, as in Alzheimer’s, may result from wayward microglia in brains where the protective brain cell aspects are absent.

We have begun to come to terms with the fact that there is much more to be discovered than we thought. As I’ve always believed, the final frontier isn’t outer space; it’s the space between our ears.

Now we are learning that forgetting is as important as memory formation in the first place. It is a process of forward and backward that keeps the scales in balance; we form memories, and we forget memories. It’s normal, and we need to relax a bit once we experience those little bits of absent-mindedness.

Accepting these new ideas about the normalcy of forgetting and the work of those tiny multi-function brain organisms flies in the face of much of what we’ve learned about remembering and forgetting in the past.

For example, if it is normal to “forget,” then what about the idea of never forgetting. This idea, which we learn in basic psychology courses, states that we can re-learn anything we’ve learned in the past because it’s never forgotten. But does this mean bits of memory are left even after the work of “forgetting” has taken place?

Well, where were those microglia? Were they somehow deficient in their job on specific types of memory and learning? Or does the hypothesis need more tweaking to make room for yet more hypotheses relative to not forgetting where there are exceptions? Where does reintegration fit in?

The entire idea is contrary to the notion of unconscious conflict that has always proposed that we retrieve painful or unacceptable memories if we have the right therapist and enough time. If forgetting is normal, wouldn’t it be counterproductive to force someone to attempt to engage in remembering things that can’t be remembered? Doesn’t that sound barbaric to you? And, of course, you pay for all of this required remembering. Are we then getting into the arena of false memories?

If you repress painful memories, what role do the microglia play in that process? Is there a mechanism by which constantly recalling a painful memory or guilty action constructs such a robust memory that it cannot be entirely erased? Wouldn’t that suggest an inability to eliminate them because of the constant recall of these memories that is reinforcing?

Or do these organisms have a memory storage center where they permit certain memories or bits of memory to live on until called forth? Forgetting may truly mean partial forgetting. In that case, therapy would be in the service of working the memory jigsaw puzzle and putting it together again — if it truly existed in the first place.

In essence, there are still many hypotheses regarding normal forgetting, intentional forgetting, and forgetting related to brain disorders. The new pathways that are being suggested are promising and offer hope for anyone who thinks all forgetting presages the development of terminal neurologic disorders; it does not. We forget because we are built to forget. It is part of our DNA, and it enables survival under extraordinary circumstances and facilitates new learning.

Of course, one mystery remains unsolved; why do those with dementia still clearly recall activities from long age in their lives while incapable of producing new memories? What makes those very old memories resistant to expungement?

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