Lecture Notes: The Human Brain with Nancy Camwisher

Course Introduction

Course: 9.13 The Human Brain Instructor: Nancy Camwisher

**Agenda for Today: **

True story about a friend's medical situation related to the mind and brain.
Themes: nature of the human mind, brain organization, recovery after brain damage, resilience, privilege, expertise.

Bob, en route to a conference, stayed over at Nancy’s house.
Nancy found Bob on the floor unresponsive after a crash.
Bob woke up woozy; EMTs found nothing wrong and advised driving him to ER.
ER didn’t find immediate issues but Nancy suggested a brain check due to past navigational issues shown by Bob.
Historical instances of Bob's navigational problems.
Past indications of possible Alzheimer's but Bob held a high-powered job and appeared normal in other ways.
ER found a lime-sized tumor in Bob's brain, next to regions involved in navigation.
Old lab scans showed the tumor starting small years ago and growing slowly.
The tumor was diagnosed as a non-cancerous meningioma that required surgery.
Neurosurgeon removed the tumor, Bob recovered but his navigational abilities did not return.

Specialized brain regions for specific functions: Bob had a navigational disability while other cognitive functions were intact.
Importance of neuroscience in diagnosing and understanding specific brain functions and capacities.
Recovery from brain damage can reveal a lot about brain architecture and function differentiation.

The brain has structured and specialized regions: Different brain parts have different functions.
Human brain organization reflects mental architecture: Specialized brain systems show specific abilities and capacities.
Importance of studying how brains change due to development, learning, and injury.
Various methods for studying the brain: Behavioral observations, anatomical imaging, functional imaging, neuropsychology, EEG, etc.

Know Thyself: Understanding our fundamental identity and how the mind operates.
Human Knowledge Limits: Understanding how the brain’s capabilities shape our knowledge limits.
Advancing AI: Insights into the brain help improve artificial intelligence by providing models for algorithms.
Intellectual Quest: Understanding the brain is a critical intellectual challenge.

Multiple levels of organization: molecules, neurons, circuits, brain regions, networks.
Primary focus on understanding mental functions: perception, cognition, language, social cognition, etc.
Utilizing methods like psychophysics, neuroimaging, neuropsychology, electrophysiology, and connectivity measures.

Perception and high-level vision: motion, color, shape, recognizing faces, places, etc.
Navigational systems and their brain bases.
Developmental neuroscience: wiring of the brain, genetic foundations vs. learned experiences.
Brain plasticity and changes in blind individuals.
Number recognition and understanding numerical cognition.
High-level human-specific functions: language, social cognition, theory of mind.
Advanced topics: brain-machine interfaces, deep learning and AI, brain networks, and more.

Reading scientific papers: Focus on understanding key questions, design, findings, and interpretations.
Combination of behavioral, anatomical, and functional studies to paint a comprehensive picture.
Engagement with recent literature to stay at the cutting edge of current knowledge.

Midterm: 25%, Final: 25%, Reading and writing assignments, quizzes
Reading: Two papers per week with written assignment for one paper.
Quizzes: About eight quizzes, brief, covering lectures/readings, given in class.
Longer written assignment: Designing an experiment, due near the end of the course.

Course aims to give a comprehensive understanding of the human brain's functions and methods to study them.
Focus on understanding cognitive neuroscience, methods, and major questions in the field.