How fast is the speed of thought?

Well, I could be way off here, but I believe the brain has the capacity to speed itself up and shift into high gear when the situation dictates.

For instance... Ever been in an accident and everything seems to slow down and you can see your surroundings in exquisite detail...

Also, dragster drivers report this when traveling down the race track at 300+ mph... Everything seems to slow down. There is a name for this, but it escapes me at the moment...

What happens is the brain thinks it is in a life or death scenario and speeds up processing to deal with it.

I remember one time, riding my motorcycle... A rock the size of my fist came flying out from some trucks wheels and came straight at my head... I swear I could see this rock rotating as it came at my face... Probably in excess of 160 km/h. Luckily, it bounced off my Plexiglas windshield and spared my life... I think I might have just twitched when it hit. Things may have slowed down for me, but I didn't seem to react any quicker... It was more of a.... Oh $#!T....

Anyway, judging by how slow things seem to be in those circumstances, I'd guess, when the brain is in 'high gear' it is running at least 5-10X faster than normal.

But, sorry, I don't know what the normal speed is... ;-)

Sorry, one more point that is kinda relevant...

It should also be pointed out that the brain is processing tonnes of data constantly. It takes what is pertinent or desired and relegates the rest of the data to the subconscious to deal with later... perhaps in a dream or something...

So, I suspect it deals with subconscious or irrelevant data more quickly then with relevant data. ie: in my motorcycle case... junk, junk, junk... ROCK... DUCK.... (or is it... duck duck goose?)

Also, I recently read a story about how "astrocytes were 'eavesdropping' on the chemical conversations between neurons"..

Interestingly, this was discovered using bits of Einsteins brain.

Full story here:
Einstein's Brain Unlocks Some Mysteries Of The Mind

[edit on 9-6-2010 by ByteChanger]

Originally posted by happygolucky
reply to post by John_Rodger_Cornman

 

Thinkin' Fast...

Around 300 milliseconds. That's how long it took a volunteer to begin to understand a pictured object. Add to that another 250 to 450 milliseconds to fully comprehend what it was.


Or...almost as fast as your ability to create threads.

This doesn't make sense, to me this seems to be how fast the brain recognises a pattern. I think thought is something a little different. It starts after recognising the object or even before...... wait now I'm confused lol.

My point is I don't think the test is 100% accurate.