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Jeffrey Epstein Ideas Forum

Is Human Intelligence Still Evolving?

Is Human Intelligence Still Evolving?


There is no doubt that human intelligence will continue to evolve. And not just an external evolution of building on acquired knowledge, but a physiological evolution of the brain and cells. How it will evolve is harder to predict.

It’s also difficult to define what we mean by human intelligence. But for the purpose of this article, we’ll define it as the ability to receive, interpret and deliver information.

It’s somewhat arrogant to assume that humans have reached a plateau in their physical evolution; particularly when one considers that we have been physically evolving for the last two and half million years. In fact, the evolution of hominid intelligence can be traced over its course for the past 10 million years, and attributed to specific environmental challenges.

We may no longer be so subjected to Darwin’s survival of the fittest, which is still alarmingly prevalent amongst, say, cockroaches and rats, but we are heading into an unchartered age of genetic manipulation, into an age of creation of the fittest.

We look forward to your thoughts on how you think human intelligence will evolve.

SOURCE: www.jeffreyepsteinscience.com

What Does Music Reveal About the Brain?

What Does Music Tell Us About the Brain?

Can music be an insight into the workings of the brain? For example, why does the brain like to hear octaves, certain harmonies and pitch resolution?

Music is the manipulation of audible frequencies. More specifically, it is the establishment and manipulation of frequency patterns and frequency intensities. So why does the brain find patterns and various sequences of frequency intensities stimulating?

Some Background:

The ear converts all sound waves into electrochemical impulses that charge the neocortex of the brain. More specifically, the basilar membrane of the brain in the cochlea, the small snail-like structure in the inner ear, vibrates to incoming sound and at different sinusoidal frequencies due to variations in thickness and width along the length of the membrane. Tonotopy studies the spatial arrangement of frequencies along the basilar membrane.

The tonotopy of frequencies projects through the vestibulocochlear nerve, through associated midbrain structures, through the auditory radiation pathway and to the primary auditory cortex. Throughout the radiation pathway, frequency organization is linear in accordance to neural sensitivity; (human auditory neurons react to vibrations in air pressure that occur between 20 to 20,000 times per second—20hz to 20,000hz on the human audible spectrum). However, binaural fusion in the superior oliviary complex affects the signal strength of each ganglion. As a result, six tonotopic maps have been identified in the primary auditory cortex of humans.

Pitches are frequencies of increasing or decreasing multiples. Higher pitches translate to higher frequencies. Lower pitches to lower ones. Pitches that are an octave apart correspond to frequencies that have exactly half or double the frequency. For example, if one note has a frequency of 440 Hz, the note an octave above it is at 880 Hz, and the note an octave below is at 220 Hz. Harmonies are frequencies with whole number multiples of the fundamental (or lowest) frequency of any pitch. Resolution in western tonal music theory is the move of a note or chord from dissonance (an unstable sound) to consonance (a more final or stable sounding one). In terms of audible frequency, resolution is the move from non-multiple frequencies back to a frequency that is a multiple of the dominant fundamental frequency.

Theories and Questions:

1. Patterns, whether visual, rhythmic or audible have been shown to stimulate the brain. Patterns facilitate and reward prediction and prediction is a network and prioritization of associative memory. Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) shows that the orbitofrontal cortex plays a critical role, amongst others, in making predictions and leads to an increase in B-endorphin levels and a decrease in plasma cortisol, a marker for stress. So what does the desire for predictions tell us about the brain?

2. Similar, to reading a book or watching a movie, the manipulation of frequency intensities found in music can mimic human life experiences and all the stimulating associations that come with it. The second question therefore, is why does the human brain like to experience a duplication of its experiences?

Cancer Resistance to Inhibitor Therapy is Not Acquired

Jeffrey Epstein, New York Financier, Advances Pivotal Findings in the Evolution of Cancer
PR NEWSWIRE

The Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation, a science philanthropy foundation based in New York City, has helped finance the first mathematical model of how human cancer cells evolve, and more specifically, how they evolve to become immune to inhibitor drug therapy, a popular alternative to chemotherapy. Cellular resistance to inhibitor drug therapy is still a major challenge to finding a cure for cancer and the new mathematical model has led to a critical understanding of how to combat it.

The mathematical model was developed by Martin Nowak, Director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics at Harvard University and a team of post-doctoral students, Benjamin Allen and Ivana Bozic. Martin Nowak, a well-known evolutionist, is also the Professor of Mathematics and Biology at Harvard. Their research was conducted from the request of the Pathology and Oncology Department at John Hopkins University. The Department was trying to understand how the KRAS gene in colon cancer cells becomes activated after inhibitor drug therapy, making the cells resistant to treatment.
By developing a mathematical model of colon cancer cell growth during the treatment of an inhibitor drug, (which typically target a protein receptor), Nowak and his team, showed how the KRAS gene is not actually activated or ‘switched on’ from inhibitor drugs but rather a small percentage of colon cancer cells with an already activated KRAS gene are immune from the start and evolve to predominance as the other cancer cells are destroyed by the inhibitor drug.

The discovery was critical in changing the approach to inhibitor drug therapy. Instead of applying a single inhibitor drug, which can lead to a resilient minority to dominate, the Pathology and Oncology Department at John Hopkins are now exploring the necessity of providing a cocktail of drugs to block all colon cancer cell types: those with the activated KRAS gene and those without. The same approach is underway for other cancer types.

Much research still needs to be done: cocktail tolerance needs to be assessed, and cocktails will have to be specific to both cancer types and their minority cells that are known to be resistant.
The Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation is known for establishing the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics at Harvard University in 2003 with a $30 million dollar grant. In addition to funding cutting edge science research across the country, the foundation also supports education in many other fields. The Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation was founded in 2000 by Jeffrey Epstein, a New York financier and philanthropist. Jeffrey Epstein also sits on the board of the Mind, Brain and Behavior Committee at Harvard.


SOURCE: www.jeffreyepsteinscience.com

Computational Biology: pattern prediction in biology.

Computational biology is the use of quantitative tools, data-analytics, mathematical modeling and computational simulation techniques to the study of biological, behavioral, and social systems.  Computational biology has been very effective when collecting large data sets and has helped sequence the human genome, create accurate models of the human brain, and assist in modeling biological systems.

Computational biomodeling, which builds computer models of biological systems, often uses visual simulations to assess the complexity of biological systems.  Biomodeling specifically uses specialized algorithms and visualization software, which help with the prediction of how bio systems will react under different environments.

Subsets of computational biology includes, computational genomics, neuroscience and pharmacology. Cancer computational biology aims to determine the future mutations in cancer through an algorithmic approach to analyzing data. Research in this field has led to the use of high-throughput measurement. High throughput measurement allows for the gathering of millions of data points using robotics and other sensing devices. This data is collected from DNA, RNA, and other biological structures. Areas of focus includes determining the characteristics of tumors, analyzing molecules that are deterministic in causing cancer, and understanding the how the human genome relates to the causation of tumors and cancer.

What all of these sub fields have in common is isolating key patterns in our biology. Pattern determination, the exceptions and derivatives, all stem from linear thinking, a type of analysis that relies on cause and effect, the only form of analysis that we know, an analysis that has helped humans survive and thrive. It is the basis of artificial intelligence. But when we learn, if ever, to emerge from the world of sequences and sensitize ourselves to other forms of occurrences, artificial intelligence and computational biology will more closely mirror the undocumented quivering of nature.

SOURCE: www.jeffreyepsteinscience.com

 

Is Human Intelligence Still Evolving?

Is Human Intelligence Still Evolving?


There is no doubt that human intelligence will continue to evolve. And not just an external evolution of building on acquired knowledge, but a physiological evolution of the brain and cells. How it will evolve is harder to predict.

It’s also difficult to define what we mean by human intelligence. But for the purpose of this article, we’ll define it as the ability to receive, interpret and deliver information.

It’s somewhat arrogant to assume that humans have reached a plateau in their physical evolution; particularly when one considers that we have been physically evolving for the last two and half million years. In fact, the evolution of hominid intelligence can be traced over its course for the past 10 million years, and attributed to specific environmental challenges.

We may no longer be so subjected to Darwin’s survival of the fittest, which is still alarmingly prevalent amongst, say, cockroaches and rats, but we are heading into an unchartered age of genetic manipulation, into an age of creation of the fittest.

We look forward to your thoughts on how you think human intelligence will evolve.

SOURCE: www.jeffreyepsteinscience.com

Our New International Site

Visit the Jeffey Epstein VI Foundation's new international website, covering international philanthropy and its support of peace accords and conflict resolution.

Go to:
www.jeffreyepsteininternational.com