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Do minds play dice?
Unpredictability may be built into our brains. Neurophysiologists have found that clusters of nerve cells respond to the same stimulus differently each time, as randomly as heads or tails. The implications of this are far reaching, but I can't say I'm all that suprised. It makes evolutionary sense, in that you can evade (or even launch) attacks better by jumping from side to side. It makes sociological sense, in that a person's environment and upbringing do not necessarily dictate how they will act in the future (the most glaring examples are criminals; surely, their childhood must have been traumatic in order for them to commit such heinous acts). It even makes sense creatively, in that "randomness results in new kinds of behaviour and combinations of ideas, which are essential to the process of discovery".

This post is part of the Kaedrin Weblog. It's been categorized under Science & Technology and was originally published in September 2001.

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