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"Professor Carla Shatz of Stanford University and her colleagues have discovered a way to revert an adult brain to the “plastic”, child-like state that is more able to form new connections quickly. The technical term “plastic” implies the ability to adapt or shape itself to new conditions. The striking results were revealed through experiments on a protein expressed in brain cells known as PirB (this is the name of the protein in the animal model, in humans it is called “LilrB2″), which seems to stabilize neural connections."
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BBC presenter Benjamin Zand recently took what he believes was a nootropic, or smart drug. The reporter is uncertain since he ordered the tablets online. In this downbeat report, he recounts the effects of the presumed modafinil:
Many so-called smart drugs have conventional uses - a popular one, modafinil, is used to treat excessive need for sleep caused by narcolepsy or shift work. But they are also being taken, in growing numbers, by people looking to work more effectively. Modafinil was dubbed the "world's first safe smart drug" by researchers at Harvard and Oxford universities who suggested its effects were "low risk" when taken in the short term. But side effects can include insomnia, headaches and potentially dangerous skin rashes, and there is a lack of long-term data.
Nevertheless, having read such positive reviews online - some claiming smart drugs had drastically improved their university grades - I decided to take it as an experiment. While it is illegal to sell modafinil in the UK without a prescription, it is not illegal to buy. There are many websites, often based in India, which make it available to purchase.
[...] The following day, a train journey presented what I expected to be a perfect opportunity to get some work done with the aid of a smart pill. I was wrong. I became distracted - more so than normal. While the drug made me focus, it was on the wrong things - such as playing video games on my smartphone. As the time passed, I began to develop a very bad headache, I lost my appetite and I needed to use the bathroom - constantly. While my brain wasn't working any faster, my bladder certainly was.
That evening, I began to feel the effects of modafinil's "wakefulness promoting agent". When I tried to get to sleep, I found myself unable to switch off until the early hours of the morning. I also found an itchy lump on the back of my leg - one on my arm appeared too the following day.
My experiences seemed a far cry from those of others. Jason Auld - an athlete and entrepreneur from Edinburgh - says he feels like he can achieve virtually anything on modafinil. "It just makes you feel as if you're operating at 100%, you're putting in all you can put in. Usually you don't think that's possible, but modafinil allows me to do it."
Related:
Cognitive Enhancement is Ethically Risky Business
Drug Unlocks Malleable, Fast-Learning, Child-Like State In Adult Brain
Ethics and the Enhanced Soldier of the Near Future
Cognitive Enhancement May Not be All It's Cracked Up To Be.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @06:33AM
You have no Rights but to Obey.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @10:44AM
Might be useful for treating people with neurological damage
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @10:56AM
Only people with neurological damage would refuse to vote Republican.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Hairyfeet on Monday November 10 2014, @03:21PM
Interesting? Really mods? For a tinfoil hat AC nutter without a fucking shred of evidence or proof or anything but the delusions in their head? And people think I'm against "freedum" for wanting a "NO AC" button...well here ya fucking go folks! THIS is EXACTLY why I want one, so I don't waste my fucking time with worthless AC posts that get modded up because they conform to a stupid fucking Internet meme, in this case appealing to the "black helicopters" crowd! What's next, a +5 if you can find a LOLCat that has a vague resemblance to whatever TFA is?
Now back to TFA....what kind of effect does this have on long term memory? Because working comp shop you have to constantly learn new OSes, technologies, and of course ways to get all this tech from different companies to play nice with each other but while I've noticed if anything my brain has gotten faster at absorbing new ideas and concepts the trade off seems to be my brain "data dumps" all the older pointless shit like who sat behind me in seventh grade math class or who played lead guitar in the pop band I was playing with in 1997. talking to other shop guys I hear the same thing, they are able to pick up new OSes, tech, hobbies, but the down side is that anything not useful for the tasks at hand tend to get tossed out, almost like the brain is making room for the new by tossing out the old...so has anybody looked into this? TFA says stability helps you retain but hampers you picking up new skills so it sounds like this is the trade off required to pick up new ideas quickly but it would be interesting to see just more much of a trade off you have to have to flick it on and off like a switch.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Monday November 10 2014, @05:18PM
Would it change your mind at all if there was a leaked manual from the US Army that detailed the steps necessary to set up interment camps foreign or domestic, and that said manual includes instructions for having "Psychological Operations Officers” re-educate detainees to agree with American policies? That manual exists, and it is FM 3-39.40. [foreignpolicy.com]
I'm not saying the government has FEMA camps waiting for us, I'm saying that they actually consider scenarios like this and once in a while (as with this document) we get proof of it. Let's not pretend that the government isn't asking itself how to best use every technological advance it can to maintain power. If they implemented the plans in FM 3-39.40 domestically for some reason it sounds like the drugs mentioned in TFA could be really useful. It sounds like they could be useful in foreign situations as well, of course, but you don't get branded a conspiracy theorist for saying that.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday November 10 2014, @07:15PM
What are your grounds for thinking it won't be used in the hypothesized manner? I'd say the odds were pretty good that it will, and about even that it will eventually be admitted to. Much worse things have been done in the not to distant past. If you include either foreign nationals, or events happening offshore, then worse things are happening right now. (And they may well be happening domestically, too, and I just haven't happened to hear about it. (Please note: I'm not talking about loose cannons, I'm talking about official policy. If I were considering loose cannons worse things are clearly happening every other month.)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Monday November 10 2014, @10:06PM
Because yet again fucking geeks are ignoring the $5 wrench solution [xkcd.com] in favor of Hollywood bullshit? yes the CIA played with LSD in the 60s, the Russians spent millions of Rubles looking for a way to make soldiers that could blow up tanks with their minds...don't make BOTH ideas completely discredited and obviously a waste of time and money now, does it? NEWS FLASH, if a government wants you gone they can either "pull an Assange" and cut you of from the world with mere threats or they can pull a Gitmo and simply drop you in a hole then forget where the hole is...they DO NOT NEED to spend countess hours and piles of money trying to pull a Manchurian Candidate by trying to use drugs never designed for that purpose which have zero guarantees of short or long term effect? yet you think this is more likely and easier than simply saying "he looks at child porn!" and insuring nobody listens to that person ever again for only the cost of a press release?
If you truly buy that I will be more than happy to sell you a genuine "Arkansas protective crystal" which is 100% effective at protecting the wearer against black helicopters and alien abduction or your money back! Only $99.99, supplies limited!
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday November 11 2014, @04:07AM
Maybe he was administered a dose of the TFA-mentioned brain plasticizer? ... Nahhh...
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @09:39PM
In response to AC modded +1, Hairyfeet writes:
Interesting? Really mods? For a tinfoil hat AC nutter without a fucking shred of evidence or proof or anything but the delusions in their head? And people think I'm against "freedum" for wanting a "NO AC" button...well here ya fucking go folks!
So what's with the .sig?
ACs are never seen so don't bother. I never surf below +2 just for you.
LOL
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday November 10 2014, @06:40AM
"Now get off my law . . . look, it's a dandelion seed ball! Let's blow on it, and pretend each seed is a spaceship!"
(Score: 1) by coolgopher on Monday November 10 2014, @07:04AM
Get your spaceship off my lawn!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @07:48AM
Step off, you greasers! I was street-racing back when ships still ran on moon water!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by zugedneb on Monday November 10 2014, @07:21AM
When I studied the more abstract topics in math such as measure theory and topology, the problem was not the ability to "learn", but the ability to "hold with steady hand" these concepts as a tool in the mind and work with them...
Also, there seems to be two parts in "learning"
-first is the part with entirely (more or less) new concept: learn something that is not already a straightforward combination of things already known, and
-second is the process of trying to understand something in terms of these new stuff
Plasticity is more relevant for the first part, the second needs the brain to be able to hold some thoughts for a longer time - cant see this as a particularly plastic process...
Of course, some would say learning =! mastering, these two processes not equal...
Also wonder how these plasticity is related to the ability to have "good" fantasies...
old saying: "a troll is a window into the soul of humanity" + also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ajax
(Score: 2) by mojo chan on Monday November 10 2014, @01:02PM
I think it would be more useful for learning lower level stuff, like say a language. Children learn language with little effort, and I've seen Chinese children come to Japan at age 7 and be pretty much fluent by age 8. I'd love to have that kind of learning ability, but my brain doesn't work that way any more so I have to do it the hard way.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 1) by takyon on Monday November 10 2014, @07:54AM
God damn lameness filter thinks my post is spam, that's a first.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Monday November 10 2014, @08:03AM
Stupid lameness filter says we can't talk about a certain drug.
Obviously, this is in an animal model (rat? paper is down [sciencemag.org]), not an adult human as the title might suggest.
We live in a world in which the flood of new knowledge is overwhelming, and our memories can be augmented by paper or computers. This is a good time for this kind of nootropic (name for "the emerging field of brain and cognition-enhancing drugs"). The downside to targeting LilrB1 through LilrB5 may turn out to be the rapid loss of older memories, but if you plan accordingly, you could manage that effect. If this research results in an actual drug within the next 20 years or so, it would be wise to approach it with caution, but I can imagine people throwing money at this like it's the-drug-which-shall-not-be-named-that-makes-males-get-an-erection. Just imagine learning from Rosetta Stone while your brain has soaked up the soluble "ectodomain" of LilrB2. Combine this drug with paper backup, the Google search engine [wikipedia.org], and perhaps brain implants, and you'll be ready for the brave new world (order?).
FUCKING
V 1 4 grr A
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by pnkwarhall on Monday November 10 2014, @01:11PM
fucking v1agr4
Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Monday November 10 2014, @02:19PM
About the drug that shall not be named. It doesn't actually *make* men get erections. What it does is provide a deficient neurotransmitter and thus *enable* men to get erections at the usual occasions for erections.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by fadrian on Wednesday November 12 2014, @04:32PM
No it doesn't.
From Wikipedia (a nice concise) description:
PDE5 (again, Wikipedia is your friend) is not a neurotransmitter, it is an enzyme found mainly in the corpus cavernosum and retina. Why the retina? Because if there is design involved here, it's not intelligent. Evolution does weird things...
That is all.
(Score: 1) by curunir_wolf on Monday November 10 2014, @01:57PM
I am a crackpot
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @02:16PM
'Cause I'm getting hammered by the tykes in online-multiplayer games. I just don't twitch quite as fast as I use to. If this drug can affect my reflexes in the same way it can reportedly enhance the malleability of the brain, then I'll be chugging 'em down by the handful!
Performance-enhancing drugs for the middle-aged gamer? It's about time!
(Score: 4, Funny) by nitehawk214 on Monday November 10 2014, @02:27PM
Yeah, I have seen this before.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1) by theronb on Monday November 10 2014, @04:31PM
I tinkered with my brain chemistry enough back in the day; I'd be reluctant to try this one until there's been many years of clinical experience. Now, if you had some orange sunshine...
(Score: 2) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday November 12 2014, @04:19PM
Now, if you had some orange sunshine...
Best I can do is Sunny Delight.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by Ken_g6 on Monday November 10 2014, @02:51PM
...in animal models...
...such as a chimpanzee...
...named Caesar.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 10 2014, @05:19PM
and you too will be able to program in Brainfuck! [wikipedia.org]
(The downside being that'll be the only language your "plastic" brains can follow...)
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Monday November 10 2014, @06:13PM
Oh yeah, I remember now.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flowers_for_Algernon#Short_story [wikipedia.org]
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Monday November 10 2014, @08:22PM
Much like the famed-yet-mythical Myostatin inhibitor for muscle growth, this new discovery may be decades from human use. I'd take both, because who wouldn't want to be stronger and smarter?
Or the dark side - imagine this new mind drug being required for job training programs.
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by fatuous looser on Monday November 10 2014, @09:26PM
Childlike is a standard-issue compound word & doesn't need a hyphen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 11 2014, @04:16AM
"Standard-issue" is not a compound word & doesn't need a hyphen but a space
Yours,
the grammarobersturmführer in charge
(Score: 1) by fatuous looser on Tuesday November 11 2014, @07:08PM
Thanks for that contribution, Mr. Führer. I have been enlightened thereby.
.
Belatedly noticed another "standard government issue" compound word in the article with a gratuitous hyphen in it: shutdown (the noun).
(Score: 1) by gumby on Thursday November 13 2014, @06:08AM
I think I learn better in my 40s than I did in my 20s (not to mention than when even younger). Better concentration, more to link it to...
My kid had to speak three languages every day when he was small (up to age 10). He was quite fluent with excellent pronunciation at 5 -- but of course had the vocabulary of a 5 year old. I learned German in my 20s and got to the 10yo level faster than he did.
Anecdote, not data, admittedly but I believe I am not an outlier!