Introducing the brain: looking at Libet's time gap II (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, March 23, 2022, 21:28 (974 days ago) @ David Turell

Another different look (study):

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220314181502.htm

"Planned movement is essential to our daily lives, and it often requires delayed execution. As children, we stood crouched and ready but waited for the shout of 'GO!' before sprinting from the starting line. As adults, we wait until the traffic light turns green before making a turn. New research explores how cues in our environment can trigger planned movement.

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"Planned movement is essential to our daily lives, and it often requires delayed execution. As children, we stood crouched and ready but waited for the shout of "GO!" before sprinting from the starting line. As adults, we wait until the traffic light turns green before making a turn. In both situations, the brain has planned our precise movements but suppresses their execution until a specific cue (e.g., the shout of "GO!" or the green light). Now, scientists have discovered the brain network that turns plans into action in response to this cue.

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"The researchers found brain activity occurring immediately after the go cue and during the switch between motor planning and execution. This brain activity arose from a circuit of neurons in the midbrain, thalamus, and cortex.

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"This work by Dr. Inagaki and his colleagues identified a neural circuit critical for triggering movement in response to environmental cues. Dr. Inagaki explains how their findings demonstrate generalizable features of behavioral control. "We have found a circuit that can change the activity of the motor cortex from motor planning to execution at the appropriate time. This gives us insight into how the brain orchestrates neuronal activity to produce complex behavior. Future work will focus on understanding how this circuit and others reorganize neuronal activity across many brain regions.'"

Comment: So it is set up and go when triggered. Explains why Libet found his gaps. And again confirms the view the brain is always prepared to help us by being set up in advance. Since we plan the movement in our brain, the brain knows the future activity before it happens. Quite a marvelous design. Could never appear by chance.