Let’s take a look at the picture we’ve made. How does our mind process information?
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You receive signals from your sensory mechanisms, and they activate neuronal networks in our brains. Most strongly coupled parts of the system enable as a whole, and that gives you a sense of the object. We can describe that part as a graph of objects that we named "Knowledge Graph."
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Information about that activations goes by another neuronal path to our Attention Filter. We don’t copy the whole object. We receive a reference.
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Our attention looks at the references it received and check their combinations with other references we already have in working memory, using recall mechanisms.
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Our working memory is what we can "see" by some part of our model that we name "I."
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By choosing the most strong signals, we travel our Knowledge Graph and try to bind together two parts of it that currently disconnected. That’s how we solve problems.
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When we have a problem, we feel curious. If we can’t solve it for a long time—we losing patience, and that’s how we abort the task. Curiosity feeling—is what helps us to move. Motivation points. Patience is what helps us to stop solving tasks that seem useless to our brains.
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To notify us about task solving results, we have regulation mechanisms. If we solved a problem—we feel inspired. If our solution gives us a result that was predicted—we’ll feel high. But if our Answer was wrong, if we had expectations that were not supported sensory—we will feel disappointed.
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All that regulation mechanisms enable L-LTP that allows us to remember results for a long period.
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If you try to use something that will solve the problem of bad feelings without finding it cause—you can run into addiction circle. Remember, in most cases, feeling yourself bad means that you have some problems. Sometimes it becomes a separate problem that will disturb you from finding a cause. In that case, you can use something to release your pain, but irresponsible usage of painkillers will lead to another problem. That’s because your brain will try to bind painkiller as a solution and will remember it.
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To find a way out from the circle that became your problem or to prevent its creation, you can use your Curiosity. It will switch your attention from disappointment and will lead you to the solution. One small picture with 4 main parts. A couple of arrows. Ten-item list as documentation for the scheme. If I had tried to show it to you before you made this path, would you find it meaningful? Interesting? But now you know what does it mean. Let’s use it to answer the questions. Why can I remember Lego, that my parents gifted me on my 6th birthday, but can’t remember that theorem of that guy, that I was learning for exams?
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Because of Lego was my present. I’ve been waiting for it. I had an expectations model, and when I saw it, my regulation system activated. The feelings and the situation were stored by long-term memory because connections in my Knowledge Graph were saved as-is by L-LTP. On the opposite, when I was preparing exams, I only coupled some objects using Hebb-s rule and E-LTP mechanism. Why do I learn texts of songs and poems so smoothly? What differs from prose? And how does this difference helps me keep poetry in mind? -Because poetry and songs have patterns that activate when you are listening to them. We are trying to predict this pattern, and we get it. And our brain activates reward mechanisms and L-LTP. That’s why we love them and can remember well. Also, patterns help our attention to successfully predict results, so we don’t lose patience. Why Feynman Lectures on Physics are enjoyable for me but a physics book from the university library—not? Why can I read the HPMoR in two evenings, without any breaks? -Because of Feynman Lectures on Physics and HPMoR well-written things, that provide me enough information to bind them with my experience. I receive a reward for reading them that gives me motivation points. They also talk to me in the language of questions and puzzles. They make me feel curious. And that provides another buff for my motivation. And physics books from the library don’t do it. I am looking at formulas, that hang in the space of my mind. I can’t connect them with real experience. I am trying to understand them, try to join to things I know, and each second decreases patience. Limit exudes, I throw the book out and start reading a feed of some IT-site because I am out of resources and need something easy to understand, to increase my motivation. How to learn something effectively? -Connect it with as much experience, as it could be, formulate a Question that will make you fill curious and do your best to answer it. Split your path for small questions. Each Answer will make you feel encouraged. That’s how you will have enough motivation to make it done. You have just finished the Circle. / If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son! "If" Rudyard Kipling. /