Evolution IQ

Does humanity become smarter?

Sergey Medvedev: At one time I was very impressed by the article by the famous Internet researcher Nicholas Carra “Does Google Merger Making us?”, Published in 2008 in the journal “Antlantic”, where he wrote that the human brain is turning off some functions due to the fact that we constantly appear electronic assistants, we are more and more delegate our thinking to the cloud, we think with the help of a google.

What happens to the collective mind of mankind as the Internet develops and with the human brain as the information revolution develops? We are talking about this with Alexander Kaplan , psychophysiologist, doctor of biological sciences, head of the laboratory of neurophysiology and the neuro interface of the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University .

The brain does not become neither stupid nor smarter

Alexander Kaplan: The brain becomes neither stupid nor smarter, because it is the same ordinary body organ as the heart, lungs, muscles and so on. He trains in the environment in which he is. In general, the brain is created by nature or evolution in order to adapt a person to the environment. Now we have such a habitat - multimedia terror, intensive streams of information ... The question is how long it can adapt, because this is still an avalanche -like process. But he adapts because we live and act in this world.

The problem is that the only category of diseases is growing - these are nervous diseases, neurotic breakdowns and the like. Cardiovascular diseases hold the championship, but they are stabilized, and these cool trend. Depressions, neurotic breakdowns and other matters not only become larger, they become harder, fatal outcomes appear. So the brain, of course, adapts, but with great difficulty.

Sergey Medvedev: Are such neurotic states signs of the complexity of adaptation of the brain?

Alexander Kaplan: These are signs of information overload of our brain. The fact is that now the human brain is exactly the same in structure and capabilities as a person from the caves was 50 thousand years ago.

Sergey Medvedev: Neurons, prisoners, roughly speaking, no more?

The only category of diseases is growing - these are nervous diseases, neurotic breakdowns and the like

Alexander Kaplan: Biologists admit that 50 thousand years ago a person has already become the way he is now. If you now take a child from that time and put at the desk, it will be the same child. By historical standards, 50 thousand years are not so long ago, because in general, human evolution is about a million or two million years. For the past 50 thousand years, the brain has already been worked out.

Sergey Medvedev: But it is loaded differently, more.

Alexander Kaplan: The brain is an organ that adapts us to the environment.

Sergey Medvedev: We are a computer, nature gave us a processor, and this is the same processor, but now it buzzes much faster?

Alexander Kaplan: It is polished to work with the environment that was 50 thousand years ago, but he had great opportunities. Perhaps we are now at the limit.

Sergey Medvedev: I wanted to ask about Flynn's effect . James Flynn, a New Zealand scientist, says that people are dying every ten years by three IQ points. This leap was especially huge in Holland, from the 60s to the 90s they jumped almost at 30 IQ points. Is it somehow observed? Does our IQ become higher as we adapt to this information environment?

Alexander Kaplan: Psychologists and biologists are very skeptical of the IQ measurement. It depends on the scales that are used. They were originally invented for people who first arrived in America: who exceeded some level - please, to America, and the rest were wrapped. This is a certain scale. Previously, it was - let's say, guess the missed letter in the word, and it was all amazing. And in our century, people in this sense do not smarter, they better fulfill this test, that’s all. The creative power of the brain, that which characterizes our “smartness”, I hope, remains at the level.

Sergey Medvedev: That is, the same thing that Homer or Leonardo da Vinci had, and now.

The brain is an organ that adapts us to the environment

Alexander Kaplan: Absolutely. The wisdom, mind and intelligence of a creative person are that which is measured by his creative successes, and not the indicators of the scales of IQ. We understand that the achievements of mankind are very dependent on individuals who are called geniuses, but they are rarely born, and this is a constant process, there are no more.

Sergey Medvedev: And the fact that we do not need to remember many things now? Here I recall the famous dialogue of the pharaoh and Thor, the inventor of writing from the Platonic "Feast" . When Thor says that he invented clay planks, Pharaoh replies: “Many -wise torus, what have you done? Now I will not need my head, because I do not need to remember all these things that are recorded on the tablet. "

So what would this pharaoh say to Google now? You don’t need to remember anything at all? Soon, years later ... Twi, or maybe faster, we will have some kind of interface that we will not have to remember anything at all: neither facts, perhaps, even words, Google will look for the right words. How to be?

Alexander Kaplan: In the history of the living there were two great revolutions - this is the emergence of a language, and then the appearance of writing. Both that, and another, a revolutionary way, not only the life of living creatures and a living creature in the form of Homo Sapiens changed, but simply brought it to the new world. Writing brought to the new world, because a person really could be postponed in external memory, that is, in books. And thus, the experience of generations accumulated in these books. How else was it to save him?

Psychologists and biologists are very skeptical of measuring IQ

But other times have come, now a revolution is also possible, but in the opposite direction, now it is Google or some other revolution, where we really do not need to remember anything, we do not need to read the books that are written (the same experience of generations), we can slide along the surface. Something is needed at the moment-they quickly looked in Google. I'm not talking about phones and so on. The brain does not focus on remembering something, because you can always see somewhere. Why is it bad? It turns out that the brain world now does not focus on its own internal memory, on its own resources. He gives some abilities to the outside world, and thus weakens his creative power.

Sergey Medvedev: Let's dream. Maybe this is not so bad, maybe the brain releases its resources in order to find connections between these fragments of information that we pump from the cloud? Let's continue this analogy of the brain and processor. After all, before the computer had a processor, there was a RAM, and there was a hard drive: here I have 500 megabytes, here I have a terabyte drive. And now everything is on the cloud, and you need a small RAM, processor and connecting to the Internet. Maybe the brain needs the same?

Alexander Kaplan: No, there are completely different things. A cloud is just an external memory, the same disk, nothing more. The operating system decides how to distribute the memory, how to get it. This address space is kept under the control of the operating system, which, relatively speaking, lives on the processor. Our operating system should live in the brain. All unexpected connections are formed there. And getting out of memory is another question. And do we need such Google, cloud memory? Why do we need such volumes of information: for example, to know about all people - this is completely not necessary in order to make creative discoveries, to receive internal inspiration. This memory is not needed, so it was not provided for by nature for the brain.

Sergey Medvedev: Maybe even a person’s creative ability is associated with the number of information pumped in his brain? Although, of course, illiterate people can produce great poetry and write paintings. But still, in my opinion, there is a linear dependence between the number of books you read, the stylistic techniques and logical moves you have received, and the product that you produce.

Alexander Kaplan: In my science, about 200 thousand articles are published annually. They can be on my computer, in my memory or in another place, but I physically cannot process them.

Alexander Kaplan

Sergey Medvedev: And 30, even 15 years ago, you could read everything that is written in your area during the year.

In the history of the living there were two great revolutions - this is the emergence of a language, and then the appearance of writing

Alexander Kaplan: In my specific area of the neuro interface, 20-30 articles came out a year 15 years ago, and now tens of thousands. It turns out, no matter how much I upload information to the computer now, this is all the unauthorized. Until I have a holistic view of things, I will intuitively know this information in order to make a discovery. So the great work. Landau, Poincare - What, did they read all the books? Rescue came to them due to their interest in specific intellectual tasks.

Sergey Medvedev: Still, apparently, the task of the brain is in the ability to find connections between fragments of information? Or is it not determined by IQ?

Alexander Kaplan: IQ is not focused on such creative achievements. He, of course, reveals people who are still smart, a little oriented. If you pass the IQ test once, then the next time it will pass much better, because you have already gained experience. And we are all not equal in our experience, someone is engaged in such a thing where there are no tasks that are in the IQ test. How creatively each person works in his own business: carpenter - how creatively he approached to make a stool, architect, scientist and so on? Everyone at their own level has creative discoveries. In a routine person who is absorbed, for example, computers and Google reference books, has already smalled less for creative discoveries, because he easily receives answers.

Sergey Medvedev: This is exactly what Nicholas Carr wrote about: Google, among other things, simplifies us to receive information, a person ceases to think about complex things. That is, you strive to simplify the receipt of information, for a certain linearity of obtaining information.

Alexander Kaplan: Google is, in general, in a sense, the same “soap opera” is only for people who think that they do not look at the “soap opera”, but get all the new and new information from Google, some particular subtleties and so on, but this does not give an opportunity to solve the problem. It is necessary to leave time in order to think.

Sergey Medvedev: So, then Google really makes us stupid? Some important functions are dying, and we become critical of technology?

Google is, in general, in a sense, the same "soap opera"

Alexander Kaplan: At the moment, the brain itself, the structure of the brain, its possibilities do not change. But the brain is not only a structure, not only a fabric, but also the contents, which fills the mental life of a person. This content becomes more flat. Please note that this is not only Google.

Sergey Medvedev: And what does the contents mean is a catalog?

Alexander Kaplan: In short, this is our mental world.

Sergey Medvedev: What is it purely materialistic, physiologically - in a particular combination of molecules in our synapses ?

Alexander Kaplan: Each new skill, each new impression is encoded by a combination of nerve cells. If you find a method and activate this combination of nerve cells, then you will show you that the same event happened, you will feel the same impression if you find this combination in a subtle way. It is necessary to catch a visual, auditory impression and so on. And there are a huge number of combinations, tens of thousands of cells throughout the brain in different places, a million billion contacts. Moreover, these combinations intersect, the same neurons can participate in different combinations. And this combination, the game of neural networks holds memory for the past, for the present and, most importantly, options for the future are played on them. That is why a person gained a great advantage in comparison with other creatures - it turns out that he lives in the aura of the future.

Sergey Medvedev: This is intuition. That is, losing the combinatorics of past combinations, you can predict the future.

Alexander Kaplan: You guessed correctly. This is not easy: what will I eat tomorrow for lunch? - This is exactly the model of this future. We live in this likely world, in our model of this world. It is as rich as the brain is rich in this combinatorics.

Sergey Medvedev: But anyway, when there will be a quantum computer, all this will be propable, which means that it is still purely theoretically possible to simulate a single human consciousness, to ensure immortality?

Each new skill, each new impression is encoded by a combination of nerve cells

Alexander Kaplan: How can we find out what will happen in the future? In principle, if the future is endless, anything can be. This cannot happen, even if we make a system with so many elements. Take a stone - there are probably more atoms there, but how will he think? This system, designed with certain connections, has been studied since birth, even while in the womb, so that it is necessary to grow this system, and not just combine transistors. You brought a super-aged computer from the store, put it on the table, but it will not work on its own, you have to launch it, somehow organize the logic of processes so that it starts to study ... nature created all this during evolution. And how will we create, grow a separate computer? Well, maybe we will grow ...

Sergey Medvedev: The brain is a kind of metaphorical muscles. Can you develop it? Let's say a person with a certain genetic set is born, with a certain genetic task. For example, I really want to learn Chinese, I want for many years, but somehow I am not approaching this. They say to me: when you learn another, hieroglyphic system of writing, you will have completely new intellectual abilities. Is it possible to train -MOZG, like a muscle?

Alexander Kaplan: Yes, of course. The brain has much more functional skills than in the muscles, it can be trained, but within the limits of the opportunities that nature set him. We, too, cannot train the muscle to infinity to raise the ton with the right hand. Each organ, each cell has its own limit, a range of functionality. People are just different from each other in how each of us has reached the limit of our capabilities - in particular, with our brain. We can say that an average person owns his brain by only 10-15%.

The famous talk that the brain works at 5% is right, but what: all nerve cells always work, the brain is completely loaded with work, but what is the point of stupid work? The correct organization of work is another 75-85% of the average, where you can organize the work of your brain. And the brain still adjusts, makes it optimal.

Sergey Medvedev: Are there moments when the brain is 100%loaded?

The brain has much more functional skills than in muscles, it can be trained, but within the limits of the opportunities that nature set him

Alexander Kaplan: I think this is far from all people. When such inspiration receives you, when you understand the essence of the problem, the essence of your solution, some kind of problem or essence of the film, books, you rise very highly. And in routine - a maximum of 15%.

Sergey Medvedev: Once in my life I felt that my brain is full, I can’t continue ... It was a very difficult exchange and sale of my apartment. A realtor came to me, he drew a complex scheme of about forty combinations: where to whom it goes, what money is transferred, where they are laid, where they get out. I sat at her night and realized that the brain said - that's it. My brain was loaded 100% and turned off.

Alexander Kaplan: Although it is impossible to say whether your memory was organized correctly. Therefore, some people learn easily, and everything is difficult for others. Of course, it’s a shame that, most likely, the brain was prepared and polished for the time, which was 50 thousand years ago. No matter how hard we try, evolution limited us this time, because further evolution has almost stopped on a person, we do not have a natural selection.

Sergey Medvedev: Natural selection has ceased, but evolution probably did not stop. Maybe a computer is a continuation of human evolution? This is the Noosphere of Vernadsky - will we all join this cloud and think with one google?

Alexander Kaplan: There is no noosphere of Vernadsky, he wrote completely about something else. Noosphere is the sphere that a person produced. There is something between us that we understand at a glance - this is the noosphere.

Sergey Medvedev: I use it metaphorically as a kind of thinking cloud.

There is something between us that we understand at a glance - this is the noosphere

Alexander Kaplan: This is not a continuation! The continuation of human evolution is something biological. Можно сказать, что новые чудеса архитектуры — это тоже продолжение эволюции человека.

Сергей Медведев: А компьютер — это не биологическая эволюция? Нейосети все больше строятся по биологическим законам.

Александр Каплан: Нейросети — это такой обман. Слово «нейро» там обозначает совсем другое. Это формальные единички, которые объединяются математическими законами, они не имеют никакого отношения к реальным нейронным сетям. Но, конечно, ученые стараются посмотреть, как устроен мозг, и попробовать как-то перенести законы естественных нейронных сетей на искусственные нейронные сети.

Но это все очень далеко от сути дела, потому что там есть одна проблематичная вещь. Искусственные нейронные сети начинают работать по алгоритмам, которые им заданы. Все эти компьютеры, роботы и так далее - это только материальные оболочки, реализующие действия алгоритмов, а алгоритмы и есть алгоритмы, они действуют шаг за шагом, от одной операции к другой.

Искусственные нейронные сети начинают работать по алгоритмам, которые им заданы

А посмотрите, как действует человек. Я всегда привожу пример Пуанкаре. Он выдвинул очень сложное предположение, я не буду сейчас его озвучивать, но начинается оно таким образом: всякое компактное односвязное трехмерное многообразие без края гомеоморфно в трехмерной сфере. Это невозможно было предположить, а он предположил, но не мог доказать, что это так, потому что у него не было логического хода. Это одна из семитысячелетних математических проблем. Он ее высказал, он уже полностью дал решение. Как он мог это сделать, если он не может это доказать? То есть он не прошел эту логическую алгоритмическую цепочку. Математики потратили сотни лет, чтобы найти эту логическую цепочку, настолько она трудна. Григорий Перельман , в конце концов, догадался, сделал это.

Сергей Медведев: Я давно читал книгу академика Фейнберга об интуиции, она называется "Две культуры. Интуиция и логика в науке и искусстве". Он говорит, что Пуанкаре не мыслит логически, он мыслит не словами, а цветовыми пятнами. Он говорит, что при интуитивной логике в мозгу все равно происходят логические вычисления, мы это просто не осознаем. В мозгу Пуанкаре была произведена эта цепочка. Только потом, сколько-то столетий спустя Перельман уже приходит к логическому доказательству, он может записать на доске цепь произошедших вычислений.

Александр Каплан: Что бы ни произошло в голове Пуанкаре, это очень сложная логическая цепочка. Ее не могли осознанно доказать лучшие математики мира. Скорее всего, никакой логической цепочки у него в голове не проскакивало. Другой, однофамилец, Ричард Фельдман, знаменитый физик, Нобелевский лауреат, исследовал вопрос о том, как же люди все-таки приходят к очень сложным открытиям. Он посмотрел Эйнштейна, всех знаменитых физиков и, в конце концов, вынес заключение: любое открытие сделано внелогическим путем. How? Он отвечает: они догадались, и это не просто шутка-прибаутка.

Мощность мозга фантастична, она может держать модель этого мира

Но это уже совершенно другой процесс: если вы целостно представляете модель этого мира, вам уже не нужно подходить логически, выстраивать эти цепочки. И то, что мы называем интуицией, — это знание приходит из этой целостности. Это не бог, не информационное поле вселенной — это целостное представление, модель этого мира.

Сергей Медведев: Точно так же, как и очень многие великие композиторы и поэты говорят, что они не придумывали что-то, они целиком слышали эту музыку. Знаменитая гипотеза третьей вселенной Карла Поппера - что существует мир постигаемый, мир физический, мир знаков, а есть мир возможных текстов, которые где-то написаны, и гениальным людям открываются каналы...

Александр Каплан: Есть такие фантастические гипотезы, а есть совершенно примитивная обычная материалистическая гипотеза о том, что мы построили модель этого мира и теперь имеем в голове эту целостность. Мощность мозга фантастична, она может держать модель этого мира.

Сергей Медведев: Ну что ж, еще раз удивимся нашему мозгу, который был создан 50 тысяч лет назад под совершенно другие задачи (например, как отбиться палкой от саблезубого тигра). Тем не менее, сейчас он может совершать великие открытия и даже взаимодействовать с такой вещью, как компьютер.