What percentage of your brain to do use?

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

This is a question that comes up quite a lot in philosophy and is often asked by amateurs and laymen who are just starting to think in a philosophical or logical manner.

The vast majority of people when asked ‘how much of our brain do you think we use’ say we only use about 10%. The rest is undiscovered, untapped, unthought…

I for one think this is complete rubbish - every single human being uses their entire brain! In short: Our brains functions within their full capability for this World and Reality, in all its myriad differences.

Now even though all humans use the full capacity of their brains this does not necessarily mean that we all have the same intelligence levels or emotional or physical. All it means is that we each have a brain that is fully functioning.

The brain is perhaps like a computer: we switch it on. we have access to every aspect of its function but we simply use that which we need immediately. We do not use every aspect of the computer immediately. Or if we do, if works without us having to consciously click everything with our mental mouse.

Why do people conintually feel limited when I laugh and say: haha, no wonder you don’t have a girlfriend, you’ve only been using 3% or your brain idiot! People seem to think that if we could use ‘all of our brain’ we could sprout wings, become telepathetic, speak every language fluently, do complex forms of mathematics without any prior education, cook complex and rich foods.

In short - people tend to believe the power of the imagination is actually falling short upon the nature of reality. If I can imagine this - why is it not possible? There must be something wrong with me. I must not be doing all that I can.

So rather than get proactive and start the slow slog of learning we make a ginat leap and claim: we only use a small percentage of our brain. (Even those with brain damage or mental hnadicap have the full functioning of their brain within the spectrum of the retardation)

I appreciate that in a very real sense there may well be parts of the brain that we do not use ‘properly’ or ‘to full capacity’ there have been cases of people suffering head trauma and being able to speak other languages fluently…or even people recieving organs and taking on charactersitics of the doner (one man recieved a heart, before he drew like a child even though he was in his 60s afterward he drew complex and detailed pictures much like that of an accomplished amatuer artist).

The fully functioning brain has is magic even as we understand it. And perhaps we have failed to utilise it and programme it effectively…but I say : every man and woman uses their brain entirely.

But then again perhaps I am just anameba and this post clearly demonstrates my brain capacity percentile i.e. 10% and all your menza 90% Ubermenschs are smirking at the smallness of my bigness.

What do you think? -1.0289%

2

A more important question (no offence), is how much of other people’s brains do you use?

3

You cheeky bastard.

4

When a person drives a car, what percent of its speed potential dose it use? What if that car drove full speed, all the time?

I believe that the human brain would burn out & die if it used 100% of itself, all at once. What do you think about my estimate? What happens to brain % being used when someone takes LSD, for example?

5

HAHA! I’m sure I use other peoples brain to a tiring degree…

But you ask a very important question: in the culture of individualism there is a tendency to dismiss the Other…the old saying ‘two heads are better than one’ probably holds true.

Together we are Stronger!! (perhaps)

Your question reminded me of this passage:

‘Self-consciousness exists in itself and for itself , in that, and by the fact that it it exists for another self-consciousness.’ For Hegel, the self exists only by virtue of being recognised by the Other. The Lord exists as lord only because he is seen as such by the bondsman and the bondsman becomes bondsman because he is seen as such the by lord, so they each constitute each other’s being.’

And therefore the use of each others brains…

I see your point Dan. We do not necessarily ‘use all of our brain’ all of the time…but the fact that the car (like the brain) can go faster doesn’t mean that it is not using its full potential…it is using what it needs at the time. But this infers what the brain has ALL THE TIME.

As for LSD this changes the perception of the mind but it does not necessarily make us ‘use more or less of our brain’. Sure, while on LSD, some parts of the brain will work more than other, some may even shut down, but this does not mean that the brain is necessarily using more or less…it is using what it needs at the time.

Brain Functioning and Perception do have an impact on each other. On Ketamine for example large parts of the brain actually shut down completely, leading to out of body experiences and feelings of dissasociation. But we this comes from cut off or harnesses the brains power…not diminishing it entirely.

6

I know this for a fact, if you were to have 100% of your brain working at once you would have a seizure and die. Also, as has been mentioned, we do only use on average 10% of our brain at any given time, but the rest will be used depending on the situation etc. Nothing worth pondering about in my opinion.

7

I think it’s hard to narrow down to a percentage.

I heard somewhere the 10% thing actually is bogus and that if we were to hazard a guess it would be a lot higher.

Still though, there is much of the brain which isn’t used, at least not in every day circumstances by most people. But it’s not so much of an area thing so much as the play of different areas with one another.

We’re coming along… although I’d say we’re not much futher increased than say, the Romans or Egyptians outside of our obvious visual spatial capabilities due to… looks around

8

That’s the thing…I think we have always had the same brain capacity…scientific discovery and any notion of ‘progress’ has no necessarily increased how much we use our brain…it has merely helped us understand our world from the slightly different perspective.

We use our brain’s fully.
Much like computer.
Everything is working away
and we use to desktop to
work the basics we need
for communication and
survival the
rest is complex programming
that deals with everything else…

We do not need to be Mechnical Engineers to drive our cars.
Similar we do not need to be neuroscientist to work our own brains.

The brain is all that is the case.
That which cannot be done with the brain we cannot do…

9

When you open up the system registry and tinker around with a few things though, you can get some aesthetics and effects most windows users can’t achieve with their basic installation.

It’s all about tinkering…

10

I think when you speak of brain function you have to seperate out higher brain function, essentially, thought, or reasoning, from lower brain function that maintains homestasis in your body.

Certain parts of your brain function continously throughout your entire lifetime. These include the cardiovascular centres in the medulla oblongata and the respiratory centres in the medulla oblongata and pons. Also, the centres which control important reflexes like the pupillary reflex are constantly at the ready. Many other brain centres also work constantly throughout our lifetime, even when sleeping.

In terms of the higher functions of language and reasoning, I don’t know what percentage of our capacity we use. But I don’t know if it is a meaningful measurement, or if it is the sort of thing that can acutally be measure neurologically. One way to proceed is to calculate what percentage of our brain is made up of frontal lobe neurons and then calculate the percentage of brain matter that is devoted to frontal lobe function.

I guess what I’m really saying is that your brain has a lot of stuff to do just to keep you living long enough to think… our brains don’t exist solely for thought.

cheers,
gemty

11

Interesting idea Colinsign, but your proposition is patently erroneous.

First, we don’t know the actual capabilities of a brain that operated “full speed” because it has never been recorded or studied.

Secondly, it is a known fact that the subconscious directly inhibits the conscious, because we are not capable of withstanding the “full speed” operation.

The physical nature of the human brain is such that only particular component areas “fire off” when they are needed for a particular function, meaning the non-stimulated areas remain “latent”.

Can we actually put a mathematical percentage on amount usage? No, that would require years more expertise on the object we desire to know with the object we use to know, which is sort of like trying to bite one’s own teeth.

Last bit, upwards of 80+% of humans use the differing spheres in separation, not in conjunction. Those we find to be truly of high IQ, engage a higher degree of cross-talk between the spheres.

We don’t know enough to make a discernably correct pronouncement about this subject. Yet, or maybe ever.

12

Appeal to Ignorance

Just because we don’t know our own limitations doesn’t mean we are at the limit.

13

Are you kidding? This is a ‘known fact’ is it? Where and by whom is this known? The very concept of the subconscious leads to an infinite regress, let alone the questions about where it manifests and by what method or faculty we might analyse its operations…

14

I’m thinking that we increase our brain’s usage when we increase our awareness of ourselves, of the world around us, when we increase our psychic activity at different times of the day, like when we dream or when we concentrate like during meditation for example…

A

15

I think the entire idea of breaking brain usage into percentage is ridiculous. Of course scientists can measure which ‘areas’ of the brain we are use and which parts we use less.

I am not appealing to ignorance. I am appealing to the mind. The mind we have, as an indication of brain function, is ALL THAT WE HAVE, and (even taking IQ into consideration) we use our brain entirely within the capacity which we demonstrate.

If there are parts of the brain yet unlocked perhaps then I will eat these words with a thick cheese sauce. We are at the limit of the mind. But that doesn’t mean anything pejorative…the limitations of the mind are actually the horizons of the possiblities of the world.

Limitations shall set you free!

16

As little as possible, I don’t want to cause a power drain and the warranty may not cover accidental blowout.

I agree with LA overall

17

I agree with Angel. But I think most people misunderstand the idea that we don’t use ‘more’ of our brain we simply utilise as different times that which we already have at our disposal.

18

The subconscious moves at a different speed then the outside world.
Talking is 5>x slower then thinking, and the unconscious creates the thoughts, therefor is more advanced and quick then its creation?

19

I used to work in neurobiology. We use 100% of our brains, nothing less. The 10% figure is an UTTER myth, and a curious irritant to neurobiologists. It may come from an attempt to estimate how much of our available memory we use, but that is actually a poorly formed question; the true function of memory is too complicated to think of as you might think of hard drive space on your computer.

100%. Nothing less. This just means that every neuron is involved in some neural pathway, not that you can’t get any smarter or learn anything new. There is no unused part of the brain. That doesn’t mean you can’t start using certain parts more than they are currently used.

20

Twifyf, you have put it more succintly than I have. I think you have hit the nail on the head.

The brain is all that is the case.