How the Brain’s Flaws Shape Our Lives

Why is it that humans are so resistant to change? Perhaps in large part this comes from a fundamental flaw in our brains. That is, that the world around us, our culture, our technology, information and our work are all moving at a tremendously rapid pace. On the other hand, evolution moves very, very slowly. Our brains, which much process all of this speed and change, are still based on an operating system for a very different, almost primitive time. And while our brains have over 90 billion neurons and 100 trillion synapses, they are simply not designed for the 21st century. In trying to reconcile all of this, our brains, like our computers, are subject to crashes as they try to cope with the expanse of modernity. These are the flaws in our brain examined by UCLA Professor Dean Buonomano in his book Brain Bugs: How the Brain's Flaws Shape Our Lives My conversation with Dean Buonomano: var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-6296941-2"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {}