In this episode of The Augmented Life, neuroscientist Dr. Daniel Toker shows us where mathematics meets the mind.
Through groundbreaking work with brain organoids and large-scale brain simulations, Toker is uncovering the fundamental patterns that distinguish conscious states from unconscious ones. His research spans from studying meditation's effects on brain waves to investigating how psychedelics alter neural complexity, offering new hope for treating disorders of consciousness.
Join us as Dr. Toker, known across socials as "the brain scientist" and host of The Brain Scientist podcast, shares new discoveries that are reshaping our understanding of consciousness, and read on for the give key takeaways from our discussion.
Right now, all of our computing artificial neural networks, none of them have anything at all like brain waves. And that might be partially because at the level of neuroscience, we're not entirely sure what brain waves are doing computationally. There are a lot of ideas out there and many different camps, but we do know that you need a lot of neurons all acting in synchrony to create brainwaves.
Brain waves emerge from a fascinating piece of brain architecture centered on the thalamus, which works like a central station receiving and directing all kinds of information - from what we see to what we feel. As signals move through this network, different parts of our brain create distinct rhythmic patterns. The most familiar is the alpha wave, which pulses 8-12 times per second in the back of our head, especially when we close our eyes. While scientists are still debating exactly what these synchronized patterns do, they're clearly a key feature that makes biological brains unique compared to artificial ones.
When systems have this Lyapunov exponent near zero, something weird happens where systems can process a lot of information... So if this picture is true, then we would expect the brain's activity should have a largest Lyapunov exponent close to zero when we're awake and conscious.
It turns out there's a sweet spot between order and chaos where consciousness lives. Think of it like walking a tightrope - lean too far toward chaos, and your brain activity becomes random and meaningless; lean too far toward order, and it becomes too rigid to process information. When we're conscious, our brains balance perfectly on this edge. This pattern shows up everywhere: in coma patients, during seizures, under anesthesia, and even across different species. When we lose consciousness, our brains drift away from this delicate balance. This discovery isn't just fascinating - it's helping scientists develop new ways to detect and potentially treat disorders of consciousness.
People fed signals into organoids, they read out the organoids electrical activity, and they were able to use this to predict how signals will evolve. Now what's really fascinating is that organoids got better at this with time without any explicit training... just by virtue of getting these signals inputted into the organoids, the organoids without any feedback or training are getting better and better at parsing out these inputs and generating more unique responses to different unique inputs.
Scientists can now grow tiny clusters of brain cells called organoids from a person's own skin cells. What's amazing is that these lab-grown neural networks can learn all by themselves - no training required. Just by receiving signals, they get better at processing information, almost like they're naturally wired to find patterns. This breakthrough could change how we develop new treatments for brain disorders. Imagine being able to test how different medications might work on your specific brain chemistry, or figuring out why some people - like redheads - need more anesthesia than others. While we're still in the early stages, these mini-brain models are opening up exciting possibilities for personalized brain medicine.
The psychedelic state is the only state that we know of that will increase the complexity or the entropy of your brainwaves relative to the normal waking state... What's interesting is that it looks like psychedelics tuned the brain's activity closer to that edge of chaos.
While most altered states of consciousness - like sleep, anesthesia, or coma - show decreased brain wave complexity, psychedelics like LSD and 5-MeO-DMT do something unique: they actually increase it. This discovery helps explain why these substances, especially at higher doses, can create such profound changes in perception and thinking. By pushing brain activity even closer to that sweet spot between order and chaos, psychedelics might temporarily enhance the brain's information-processing abilities. This finding has captured the attention of consciousness researchers worldwide, including those at leading institutions like the Qualia Research Institute. By studying how these powerful compounds affect brain wave patterns, we're gaining unprecedented insights into the nature of consciousness itself.
One way to shift your brainwaves now, which we know is going to be protective for your brain in the future is meditation... We still don't know exactly what's happening in the brain when we meditate, but there's been a lot of research on these really fast oscillations called gamma waves.
Meditation creates measurable changes in our brain wave patterns, particularly in gamma waves - neural activity that oscillates between 30 to 80 times per second. Scientists have observed that regular meditation practice preserves brain regions that typically deteriorate with age, especially in the prefrontal cortex. This discovery bridges contemplative practice with neurobiology, suggesting concrete ways we might protect our cognitive function over time. The research extends beyond individual wellness, offering insights into treating disorders of consciousness and developing new therapeutic approaches for conditions like coma and vegetative states.
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