Can the human brain ever be full?

Question

Will it ever once stop accepting new information or will it continue to expand in order to accommodate?
In other words, is there a capacity to how much a brain can store before it must forget things or does it store everything without forgetting anything?

Answer 1

never youll never use even 38% before your dead and gone.......skipper

Answer 2

Your brain isn't like a box or a computer, in the sense that you keep putting things into it, and eventually it gets full unless you empty it. It's very selective about what it turns into long-term memory and what it discards after a few minutes or hours. For example, you probably won't remember what you had for dinner a month ago, because your brain didn't classify that as significant information. But you will remember the day your child was born (if or when you have a child/children). The truth is that we use all of our brain. The myth that we use only 10% of it or whatever percentage is just a myth. I believe it started with a newspaper misquoting someone, actually. Our brain is essentially constantly throwing stuff out, that it doesn't deem important or significant. Something interesting you might want to look up -since you mentioned the brain storing everything without forgetting anything- is autism. Some autistic people have incredible memories that allow them to memorize amazing amounts of information instantly, and they can just recite it back to you perfectly, days, even weeks later.

Answer 3

It's important to understand the complexity of the human brain. The human brain weighs only three pounds but is estimated to have about 100 billion cells. It is hard to get a handle on a number that large (or connections that small). Let's try to get an understanding of this complexity by comparing it with something humans have created--the entire phone system for the planet. If we took all the phones in the world and all the wires (there are over six billion people on the planet), the number of connections and the trillions of messages per day would NOT equal the complexity or activity of a single human brain.

Let's start looking at the building blocks of the brain. As previously stated, the brain consists of about 100 billion cells. Most of these cells are called neurons. A neuron is basically an on/off switch just like the one you use to control the lights in your home. It is either in a resting state (off) or it is shooting an electrical impulse down a wire (on). It has a cell body, a long little wire (the "wire" is called an axon), and at the very end it has a little part that shoots out a chemical. This chemical goes across a gap (synapse) where it triggers another neuron to send a message. There are a lot of these neurons sending messages down a wire (axon). By the way, each of these billions of axons is generating a small amount of electrical charge; this total power has been estimated to equal a 60 watt bulb. Doctors have learned that measuring this electrical activity can tell how the brain is working. A device that measures electrical activity in the brain is called an EEG (electroencephalograph).

Each of the billions of neurons "spit out" chemicals that trigger other neurons. Different neurons use different types of chemicals. These chemicals are called "transmitters" and are given names like epinephrine, norepinephrine, or dopamine. Pretty simple, right? Well, no. Even in the simplified model that I'm presenting, it gets more complex

Is the brain like a big phone system (because it has a lot of connections) or is it one big computer with ON or OFF states (like the zeros and ones in a computer)? Neither of the above is correct.

Let's look at the brain using a different model. Let's look at the brain as an orchestra. In an orchestra, you have different musical sections. There is a percussion section, a string section, a woodwind section, and so on. Each has its own job to do and must work closely with the other sections. When playing music, each section waits for the conductor. The conductor raises a baton and all the members of the orchestra begin playing at the same time playing on the same note. If the drum section hasn't been practicing, they don't play as well as the rest of the orchestra. The overall sound of the music seems "off" or plays poorly at certain times. This is a better model of how the brain works. We used to think of the brain as a big computer, but it's really like millions of little computers all working together

I think I have answered and still the question remains at the same level.

Answer 4

We forgot things all the time. You do not remember everything that has ever happen to you. Do you remember the question the teacher asked you on Wednesday the 6th week of 2nd grade?

We are just beginning to understand how memory actually works in our brain. Our brains do not grow as we accumulate more information.

By the way there is an old saying that we only use 10% of our brain. There is no scientific basis for that.

Answer 5

The answer is yes-ish.

Firstly the brain is not like computer memory, it is not filled up in the same way.

Rather we learn certain things by building up associations. These associations have a physical nature, and are the dendrites, the connections bettween neurons (different from the axions). When we are young we can grow many of these dendrites so it is easy for us to learn more information.

As we get older it is harder for us to grow dendrites. So it is harder to learn new things. In addition in an area we know a lot about it is harder for us to learn new information as we already have many associations (our brain is getting full). However if we go and learn in a completely new area it is easier for us to learn new information as this part of the brain is not full.

Full in this sense is a little bit different. It is like a room filled with people. we can keep adding more people, but after a while the new people need to squeeze in, so adding in new people is harder, even though there is in fact plenty of room available and a room full of people can probably add in 2, 3 or more times as many people.

Answer 6

Since we only use a very small portion of our brains, we will never know the extent of it's capacity, functions and ability. The more you put into the brain the more you will retain thus using more brains than others. Keeping your brain active helps the function but we will never know how much the brain can store.

Answer 7

the brain is like a cup, it gets full eventually so it makes room for new things by pouring out old unnecessary (sometimes necessary things like memory) this usually happens at old age thats why people get Alzheimer's disease and that. but we are making room for our brain all the time from birth but you just don't notice because the brain is so massive. on average, humans use only about 10% of their brain power so u think the short answer is no.

Answer 8

Yes there is a capacity but I don't remember the exact number (I read it in my AP psych textbook...if you REALLY want me to find it then you can e-mail me at ravin gin at hotmail dot com) but it's something ridiculous like 1 billion items or something like that...but the human doesn't have the opportunity to take in that much. People's short term memory is generally 7 items (like a 7-digit phone number...try to remember a 14 digit number and you will likely mess up.) People's ability to remember something drops with time unless there's 1) repeated exposure/practice/something along those lines (ex: you always speak spanish with your grandmother so you don't forget it,) or 2) really strongly affected by that thing emotionally or otherwise (ex: if you are a war veteran you might remember a lot of things from the war really vividly forever.) The brain doesn't "store everything" forever but some things are imprinted in the subconscious (ex: a person who has alzheimers might claim that they never learned how to knit but if you teach them every day then as time goes on they will get better at knitting...even if you have to "teach" them every day they will just have become better knitters.)

Answer 9

I think one can never stop learning and holding new information in one's brain. And when someone forget something, I think that information is still in the brain. When I try to remember something, it usually doesn't hit me until later on.

Answer 10

No human brain can never be full. Seriously. Neurone cells are specialised and do not differentiate. (sry kinda bio here)

Einstein only used about 4% of his brain capacity despite his intelligence! But you can make more connections between your nerve cells to expand your memory. :)

Answer 11

To my knowledge, no one has ever proven the human brain will not continue accepting new information, as long as a particular brain remains "intact".