Ep 199: Unconscious learning, your brain, and savant syndrome

Ep 199: Unconscious learning, your brain, and savant syndrome

Unconscious learning, your brain, and savant syndrome

Today we talk about your brain and unconscious mechanisms of learning. From losing a skill for no apparent reason, to acquiring languages, to unfortunately learning paralysis and pain, to savants who apparently learn without consciously attempting to, we cover some oddities about the way your brain works and how you learn.

Here’s a link to a tedtalk by VS Ramachandran. He covers several interesting conditions, including phantom limb pain, and synesthesia.

3 clues to understanding your brain

Here’s a documentary about Daniel Tammet, who learned enough Icelandic in a week to be interviewed in that language on television.

The Boy With The Incredible Brain

Here’s a talk with Daniel Tammet and his tutor in the language of Icelandic, about what it was like to learn the language in such a short time.

Daniel Tammet and our adventure into Icelandic

Here’s a segment about Orlando Serrell. He became a calendar calculator and had improved memory after being hit in the head by a baseball as a child.

Spontaneous Savant

Here are many articles about language and the brain, and the debate over which side of the brain might be doing what.

Children show right-lateralized effects of spoken word-form learning

Left Side Of Brain Activates Speech From Birth

When an Adult Adds a Language, It’s One Brain, Two Systems

Right brain also important for learning a new language

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