Neuroscience and human behavior still remain mainly a mystery. Because of that, they have accrued an unusually high number of theories. Take any intro to psychology class to see the diversity and breadth of theories that supposedly explain human behavior. So hey, why not add one more?

Two Carnegie Mellon scientists have come up with a new theory, this one based off a computational slant. I haven’t read their paper yet (saving that for my 5 hour layover in Detroit later this week) but the press release makes me dubious. Their theory involves regions of the brain “volunteering” themselves for tasks. When a primary region is damaged, lesser apt regions volunteer to take the load and restore partial function. This mimics how the brain recovers from damage by switching brain activity to a undamaged region.

I’ll withhold criticism until I read the paper, but it sounds far too simplistic. I highly doubt the regions in our brain are volunteering on a moment-to-moment basis over who can perform which task. Plus, I doubt their model incorporates regions growing or expanding, rather than just being damaged or not. And I doubt it includes the capability to incorporate new regions.

Carnegie Mellon University neuroscientist Marcel Just and Stanford postdoctoral fellow Sashank Varma have put forward a new computational theory of brain function that provides answers to one of the central questions of modern science: How does the human brain organize itself to give rise to complex cognitive tasks such as reading, problem solving and spatial reasoning? Just and Varma’s theory, called 4CAPS, is described in the fall issue of the journal Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience.

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Just and Varma, however, propose that the evidence reveals a more complex picture in which thinking is a network function — a collaboration of several brain areas that is constantly adapting itself, based on the task at hand and the brain’s own resources and biological limitations. The collaborating parts of the brain, according to Just, are like members of a sports team whose players substitute in and out of the action. 4CAPS (an acronym for Capacity Constrained Concurrent Cortical Activation-based Production System), proposes a decentralized process by which members of the cortical team volunteer themselves when their strengths are called for, but also permits less efficient but capable members to step forward when the primary player is injured or disabled, as might occur as a result of a stroke. Just and Varma have constructed a number of computational models to demonstrate this process, such as a model that understands English sentences.