The second I read the thread title, I knew this was going to be about an autistic savant. Autism has always fascinated me... the human mind is such a mysterious thing. Apparently scientists have been able to replicate this sort of savant ability (photographic memory and such) in normal people by temporarily disabling certain areas of the brain with electromagnetic impulses. I forget the details, but it's pretty fascinating stuff.
Thats pretty cool but i wonder how long before he goes completely insane because hes head is full of images?
Humans are not supposed to memorize everything only some key parts and rebuild the rest of the image through logic and stuff. Like take a newspaper and stare at it, then close your eyes and bring up the mental image of it. Atleast i can see the the newspaper, the text and pictures but i cant read the text not even headlines even tho at first the mental image looks like an accurate replica. Same thing is with a birds eye view of a city, the roads and buildings and cars and stuff are all there but randomly placed. Then again maybe i only have some very basic visual memory type...
Toomas, did you miss the part about him being autistic?
"Steven is autistic; he lives in a world of his own. Communication is difficult for him. He didn't speak his first words--'pencil' and 'paper'--until he was five."
You're right that a normal human mind isn't supposed to work like that, but he doesn't have a normal mind. His extraordinary ability comes at the cost of things like normal social skills, the ability to understand figurative language, and probably a myriad of other things that most normal people take for granted. For example, if you were to ask him to draw something original from his own imagination, he would probably have a difficult time doing so, or possibly even a difficult time understanding what you were asking him to do.
I know that he is autistic but it does not mean that he has unlimited memory. It will propably get full or he cant cope with the amount of info anymore and then he cant tell what he saw 2 seconds ago.
It's amazing what the human mind can do when it is lacking certain abilities, it really makes up for it in other ways! This guy's skills are incredible!
[ QUOTE ]
I know that he is autistic but it does not mean that he has unlimited memory. It will propably get full or he cant cope with the amount of info anymore and then he cant tell what he saw 2 seconds ago.
[/ QUOTE ]
hehe, what makes you think a brain is so limited that it can get full with such a small amount of data?
reminds me of a 20/20 special i saw a long time ago about this guy sculptor savant
He can sculpt anything he sees, even if it was only a glimpse of it, and he can sculpt anything accurately down to the most minute detail in a matter of hours.
[ QUOTE ]
I know that he is autistic but it does not mean that he has unlimited memory. It will propably get full or he cant cope with the amount of info anymore and then he cant tell what he saw 2 seconds ago.
[/ QUOTE ]
I'm pretty sure that photographic memory comes from an extraordinary ability to recall memories, not any special ability to store them. If I remember correctly from my psych classes, the human mind doesn't actually forget anything (assuming one doesn't have physical brain damage); if we can't remember something, it is because we are unable to recall the memory, but the memory is still there. You probably have every line of dialogue from every movie you've ever seen stored in your memory; you just don't have the ability to recall those memories. It's easier for you to recall certain memories because they are associated with certain cues (i.e. a specific sound, smell, word, emotion, etc).
That guy is amazing ...they say Einstien was probebly a sevant. He makes me think of Da Vinci and how incredible his mind was . Not only was he probebly one of the 5 most advanced artists that ever lived but also an engineering and creative genius also . Maybe in the vast future people like Da Vinci will be common place . I hope so that would be a great world !
I remember reading something that said that it is believed that autistic people often don't "filter" things the way normal people do. They take in all of the information infront of them. Normal people really only pay attention to what is important to them, everything else is simplified or filtered out by the brain. Autistic people supposedly have difficulty or simply don't assign importance to things in their visual field that way and their brain gives them basically the full feed minus significance. I also read that many autistic people have a hard time, or simply can't imply emotional states from facial expressions. That seems to be another product of their inability to assign significance.
I knew a guy who was a musical savant. Could hear any piece of music just once, and immediately play it note for note on a guitar. I think he could also do it on piano, but I never witnessed it. If you named a song, he could play it.
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[ QUOTE ]
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
And how much information per byte do you get in human terms? 1GB for each of your parents faces? 16kb to tie your shoelaces? It's a bit like Sony saying the ps3 does 15 terraflops! Whatever the hell that means. I'm not having a go at you, I just think it's much harder to quantify exactly when a person can run out of memory than what you've said there.
[ QUOTE ]
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
[email="1600x1200@30fps"]1600x1200@30fps[/email] uncompressed video would fill that space in 310days (in this case i used 16 hours per day as thats how long people usually are awake).
toomas the probem with your theory is that the brain does not store information like a computer, in fact I think the human brain stores information much more efficiently.
[ QUOTE ] If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards , I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
[/ QUOTE ]
From that i conclude that the 50tera estimate is in computer terms...
yeah but we dont remember in pixels, we rembember in lines and colour and 3d awarness. its probably more akin to remembering a linear 3d game (like a racing game)with continous track and scripted events, instead of remebering every "pixel" wed remeber the shape of the helicopter that passed over its colour, its relation to us and other things in the scene etc etc. it would take up a lot less memory than "video" (that idea of memory is soooooo Mega CD)
i also heard somewhere that your eyes are like 100 mega pixel resoloution or sommit so 1600x1200 wouldnt cut it
[ QUOTE ]
That guy is amazing ...they say Einstien was probebly a sevant. He makes me think of Da Vinci and how incredible his mind was . Not only was he probebly one of the 5 most advanced artists that ever lived but also an engineering and creative genius also . Maybe in the vast future people like Da Vinci will be common place . I hope so that would be a great world !
[/ QUOTE ]
they? anyway. Yeah, Einstein had connected middle lobes (or some shit) where normal people have detached ones. He had some extra brain going on, basically.
his party trick is,if you go upto him and say your birthday,like mine is 19th July 1986....instantly he can tell me who was at number 1 and the name of there song in the charts when I born and he can do that back to the time Music became big.
if you ask him about a song from a the "NOW" series of CDs (dunno if you US guys get them but they are comulation CD of the popular music at the time....think we have 2 or 3 released evry year and we are on soemthing like "NOW 64" or something.) he can give you the CD number as well as the track number of any song from any of those 64 double CD sets. its pretty insane.
Facinating stuff.
John
Edit:- Just told my mum about this,she is a university lecturer/nurse that specilises in Autism,apprently another thing they do which I found intresting is not only do they remeber things,but especially when do art from memory they apprently tend to reverse it...so when we (as "normal" people)look at there work it would looking as if we were looking into a mirror.
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
[Email]1600x1200@30fps[/Email] uncompressed video would fill that space in 310days (in this case i used 16 hours per day as thats how long people usually are awake).
[/ QUOTE ]
I'm going to hazard a guess and say that the human mind probably doesn't store visual data as an mpeg or avi .
Another problem with making that analogy is that you are comparing digital information, which is really just a series of samples with analog experience and info which is a constant stream with basically an infinite level of complexity. Also being able to remember and recall experiences may work more like dreaming. So it might not be a matter of all the details of a specific experience being stored, like Shep said, but specific bits of info and thousands of connections coupled with the power of our brain's reality creating engine.
[ QUOTE ]
I wonder what resolution human eyes are, and whether the brain has a decent compression algorithm...
[/ QUOTE ]
From wikipedia: "The human retina contains about 125 million rod cells and 6 million cone cells."
However, the rod cells are used for motion detection, low light vision, whereas the cone cells are used for color and details (you use cone cells for whatever your vision is focusing on and rods for periphery vision). But still, a resolution of 6 million spanks any computer out there. Of course, the brain does all the interpreting of information, not the eye and there's millions of neurons working hard to figure out what the eye is seeing at any given time. AFAIK, the brain doesn't even use a compression algorithm but is able to compute everything realtime. Bottom line, the brain is awesome!
Also, the brain has a virtually inexhaustible memory storage capacity. Like someone said before, it's just a matter of getting those memories out.
ALSO, I heard somewhere that people with photographic memory don't just memorize vision, but also the smells and feelings they were experiencing at the moment they were encoding their memories (which might explain they are able to recall the memories better).
I was a cognitive science major in college, so that's why I sound so nerdy.
Replies
I wonder how good he is with people, as in drawing them.
'nuff said.
draw us
Humans are not supposed to memorize everything only some key parts and rebuild the rest of the image through logic and stuff. Like take a newspaper and stare at it, then close your eyes and bring up the mental image of it. Atleast i can see the the newspaper, the text and pictures but i cant read the text not even headlines even tho at first the mental image looks like an accurate replica. Same thing is with a birds eye view of a city, the roads and buildings and cars and stuff are all there but randomly placed. Then again maybe i only have some very basic visual memory type...
"Steven is autistic; he lives in a world of his own. Communication is difficult for him. He didn't speak his first words--'pencil' and 'paper'--until he was five."
You're right that a normal human mind isn't supposed to work like that, but he doesn't have a normal mind. His extraordinary ability comes at the cost of things like normal social skills, the ability to understand figurative language, and probably a myriad of other things that most normal people take for granted. For example, if you were to ask him to draw something original from his own imagination, he would probably have a difficult time doing so, or possibly even a difficult time understanding what you were asking him to do.
I know that he is autistic but it does not mean that he has unlimited memory. It will propably get full or he cant cope with the amount of info anymore and then he cant tell what he saw 2 seconds ago.
[/ QUOTE ]
hehe, what makes you think a brain is so limited that it can get full with such a small amount of data?
Thats why you cant remember everything you see in the first place...
Small amount like remembering everything you can see?
Thats why you cant remember everything you see in the first place...
[/ QUOTE ]
haha... yah that's it...
sculptor savant
He can sculpt anything he sees, even if it was only a glimpse of it, and he can sculpt anything accurately down to the most minute detail in a matter of hours.
I know that he is autistic but it does not mean that he has unlimited memory. It will propably get full or he cant cope with the amount of info anymore and then he cant tell what he saw 2 seconds ago.
[/ QUOTE ]
I'm pretty sure that photographic memory comes from an extraordinary ability to recall memories, not any special ability to store them. If I remember correctly from my psych classes, the human mind doesn't actually forget anything (assuming one doesn't have physical brain damage); if we can't remember something, it is because we are unable to recall the memory, but the memory is still there. You probably have every line of dialogue from every movie you've ever seen stored in your memory; you just don't have the ability to recall those memories. It's easier for you to recall certain memories because they are associated with certain cues (i.e. a specific sound, smell, word, emotion, etc).
Linky ..
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
And how much information per byte do you get in human terms? 1GB for each of your parents faces? 16kb to tie your shoelaces? It's a bit like Sony saying the ps3 does 15 terraflops! Whatever the hell that means. I'm not having a go at you, I just think it's much harder to quantify exactly when a person can run out of memory than what you've said there.
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
[email="1600x1200@30fps"]1600x1200@30fps[/email] uncompressed video would fill that space in 310days (in this case i used 16 hours per day as thats how long people usually are awake).
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards , I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
[/ QUOTE ]
From that i conclude that the 50tera estimate is in computer terms...
i also heard somewhere that your eyes are like 100 mega pixel resoloution or sommit so 1600x1200 wouldnt cut it
That guy is amazing ...they say Einstien was probebly a sevant. He makes me think of Da Vinci and how incredible his mind was . Not only was he probebly one of the 5 most advanced artists that ever lived but also an engineering and creative genius also . Maybe in the vast future people like Da Vinci will be common place . I hope so that would be a great world !
[/ QUOTE ]
they? anyway. Yeah, Einstein had connected middle lobes (or some shit) where normal people have detached ones. He had some extra brain going on, basically.
his party trick is,if you go upto him and say your birthday,like mine is 19th July 1986....instantly he can tell me who was at number 1 and the name of there song in the charts when I born and he can do that back to the time Music became big.
if you ask him about a song from a the "NOW" series of CDs (dunno if you US guys get them but they are comulation CD of the popular music at the time....think we have 2 or 3 released evry year and we are on soemthing like "NOW 64" or something.) he can give you the CD number as well as the track number of any song from any of those 64 double CD sets. its pretty insane.
Facinating stuff.
John
Edit:- Just told my mum about this,she is a university lecturer/nurse that specilises in Autism,apprently another thing they do which I found intresting is not only do they remeber things,but especially when do art from memory they apprently tend to reverse it...so when we (as "normal" people)look at there work it would looking as if we were looking into a mirror.
[ QUOTE ]
If you relate the storage space of the brain to PC standards, I read an article that estimated the brain's capacity at 50 terabytes, or something to that figure.
I don't think he'll be "running out" of space., anytime soon
[/ QUOTE ]
[Email]1600x1200@30fps[/Email] uncompressed video would fill that space in 310days (in this case i used 16 hours per day as thats how long people usually are awake).
[/ QUOTE ]
I'm going to hazard a guess and say that the human mind probably doesn't store visual data as an mpeg or avi
I wonder what resolution human eyes are, and whether the brain has a decent compression algorithm...
[/ QUOTE ]
From wikipedia: "The human retina contains about 125 million rod cells and 6 million cone cells."
However, the rod cells are used for motion detection, low light vision, whereas the cone cells are used for color and details (you use cone cells for whatever your vision is focusing on and rods for periphery vision). But still, a resolution of 6 million spanks any computer out there. Of course, the brain does all the interpreting of information, not the eye and there's millions of neurons working hard to figure out what the eye is seeing at any given time. AFAIK, the brain doesn't even use a compression algorithm but is able to compute everything realtime. Bottom line, the brain is awesome!
Also, the brain has a virtually inexhaustible memory storage capacity. Like someone said before, it's just a matter of getting those memories out.
ALSO, I heard somewhere that people with photographic memory don't just memorize vision, but also the smells and feelings they were experiencing at the moment they were encoding their memories (which might explain they are able to recall the memories better).
I was a cognitive science major in college, so that's why I sound so nerdy.
Peace!