Mimi Buendia November 10, 2014
Core Chem Odd C Block Mr. Ippolito
In the article Learning How Little We Know About the Brain, written by James Gorman for The New York Times, discusses how the understanding of the brain is improving at a fast pace. Top neuroscientists spend up to $4.5 billion a year on research. However, even though there has been new technology that has been improving and advancing the research, there are still many unanswered questions. Larry Abbott, switched fields from theoretical physicist to neuroscientist, understands how complex the brain is, but performs brain experiments. Dr. Abbott was very brave to switch fields at such an old age. He described the reason he switched was when “electrical activity of neutrons and translating it into clicks that could be heard over speakers each time a cell fired or spiked”. Dr. Marder and Abbott invented a technique, which was “a way to link brain cells to a computer to manipulate their activity and test ideas about how cells and networks of cells work”. Dr. Abbott is now working at Columbia University, known for the biggest neuroscience program. He has been working on a model to describe how the brain might actually work with thousands of neurons working together. “Computer analysis helps to reduce and simplify such a picture but the goal is to discover the physiological mechanism in the data”. Dr. Abbott is trying to determine what the firing neurons tells us. By testing on electrical fish reveals a “group of neurons were sending out a delayed copy of the command that another part of the brain was sending its electric organ” and “went straight to the passive sensing system to cancel out the information from the electric pulse”. The fish experiments displays how sorts data.
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ReplyDeleteGorman, James. "Learning How Little We Know About the Brain." The New York Times. The New York Times, 10 Nov. 2014. Web. 12 Nov. 2014. .
ReplyDeleteMimi’s report was well written. She clearly explained the broad topic of the article to begin, which I thought was a good way to start off her discussion, and also summarized the information of the article very well. Additionally, Mimi wove quotes taken directly from the original article into her writing, which enriched the quality of the overall report. Of course, Mimi also did many other things well, but those three clearly stood out to me. Despite all the things she did well, she didn’t really talk about the connections that could be made between the article and the affect it could have on society as a whole, or the strengths and weaknesses of the article. Perhaps she could have mentioned how, with more reaserach, what signifacence a full model of the brain could have on us. Mimi also could have talked about the quality of the author’s writing. Overall, I did learn information I didn’t know previously about the studies going on concerning the brain, including how expensive ($4.5 billion a year) the research can be. That surprised me, as $1 billion is a huge amount of money, and over 4 times that a year is spent on brain research. That really makes me wonder about why the studies are so important and how they could (eventually) change our lives.
Caroline Kirby
Gorman, James. "Learning How Little We Know About the Brain." The New York Times. The New York Times, 10 Nov. 2014. Web. 12 Nov. 2014.
ReplyDeleteOverall Mimi did a great job on her report. Her summary was well written and summed up the article into a short and orderly paragraph. In addition, Mimi included multiple quotes and details that helped explain her topic even further. Finally, I thought she did a good job including more information after stating the quote. This was definitely necessary for the readers, as many of us do not understand some of the phrases used by the scientists. Although Mimi did a great job on her report, she could have included some other key elements in her review. The connection to society was not very clear and I was unable to discover the impact all of this information will ultimately have on my life. In addition, it would have been nice to see a critique on the writers article. Mimi could have shared what she thought the author did well and what they did poorly. Her opening fact really struck me. I would have never imagined that $4.5 billion a year go into brain studies.
ReplyDeleteMimi did a very good job in reviewing this article. One thing that she did well was import quotes from the article. It flowed very well. She also told it in a way that was very attractive and I wanted to keep reading it. Also, in her review, you could tell that she understood the topic she was not just writing down information from the article. One thing that she could have done better was describe why this article is important to society, which is one of the things we were told to write about on the rubric. She also did not give much of a critique on the article, which we are also told to do in the rubric. The opening fact was very surprising about the cost of research on the brain. I did not know it could cost up to $4.5 billion!
Mimi’s review was very good. One thing that I like about was how she summarized this article, it was clear and easy to understand. Also I like that she used quotes from articles to support her review. She also put a lot of specific information in her review. However she could say how those things related to society and she could put more her opinion to it. Over all I think she did very well and I didn't know they spend $4.5 billion on brain studies.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteGorman, James. "Learning How Little We Know About the Brain." The New York Times. The New York Times, 10 Nov. 2014. Web. 12 Nov. 2014.
ReplyDeleteOverall, Mimi did a great job of reviewing this article. I liked that she used many quotes to explain Dr. Abbott's fascination with neuroscience as well as the plans that these scientists have for future study of the brain. I also liked that Mimi explained many different aspects of neuroscience, including information about how far it has come but also how much it still doesn't know. A third thing that I liked about Mimi's review was that she gave details that enriched our understanding of the topic, such as specific programs that certain scientists run or how much money is spent on neuroscience each year. One thing that I think Mimi could have improved upon was to explain certain parts of the article more thoroughly. The quotes that she used were helpful and enriching, but Mimi didn't give any further explanation about the situation after stating what the scientists said. Another thing that Mimi could have improved was to finish her review. It ended abruptly in the middle of a sentence, which was obviously not intentional, but it left the review incomplete. I am not sure if Mimi would have continued to give further explanation had the review not ended so abruptly, and certain parts required in the review were missing, which she might have put in but got cut out. One thing that I found quite interesting was that scientists might be able to develop a model of how the complete brain works. This interests me because I thought that scientists had already developed such a model. This fact made me realize that scientists know even less about the brain than i had thought. While Mimi's article was well written and made me realize that we aren't as advanced as we assume, it felt unfinished and left some information unexplained.
Mimi did a good job of presenting this article. I like how she explained the difference between theoretical physicists and neurophysics. She used several quotes from her article to support her point, and to help the reader get a sense of context. She also summarized such a complicated topic very well.
ReplyDeleteMimi's review needs work in organizing similar ideas, like when she says, “Dr. Abbott was very brave to switch fields at such an old age. He described the reason he switched was when ‘electrical activity of neutrons and translating it into clicks that could be heard over speakers each time a cell fired or spiked’. Dr. Marder and Abbott invented a technique, …” I think the two sentences could be joined more smoothly. Maybe she should use transition words such as therefore or also. Mimi’s writing also should be reread for spelling errors.
I was surprised to learn that neuroscience research can cost so much ($4.5M).
Mimi did a very well job giving us information with lots of facts and details. It taught me about the brain in a new sight and most stuff was new information. I really liked her explanation about neurophsics. She could have organized it better. Mimi should had more facts and quotes from Dr. Abbott. She should have more transition words and grammar. I really liked her information and I realized that we are not so advanced as everyone thinks.
ReplyDeleteMimi did a great job on explaining the article overall. She stated the purpose of the article, had some quotes, and included different names of the scientists that were said in the actual article. To improve the review she could go into a little more depth, but not over state fact that it gets boring to read. She could also transition into new ideas a little better. But in general this was a well written review on an article and I can not believe they used $4.5M on brain studies!
ReplyDeleteGorman, James. "Learning How Little We Know About the Brain." The New York Times. The New York Times, 10 Nov. 2014. Web. 12 Nov. 2014
ReplyDeleteOverall, I think Mimi did a really good job on her review. She summarized the article thoroughly, so the reader can understand what the main points of the story were. She included good background information about neuroscience so the reader understood the topic, and also explained Dr. Larry Abbott’s role in this field well. Mimi’s review was also very well written, fluent, and concise. It was too lengthy, so her work was understandable and easy to read. I also think that Mimi did an excellent job at weaving direct quotes from the article into her review. This helps to give the reader a sense of the author’s direct opinions and words. While her summary of the article was very well done, Mimi also could have included more on the connection to society, or given a critique. By discussing the article’s connection to society, Mimi could have helped to personalize the information to the reader. She could have spoken about what the direct effect of the brain research is on us, and how it might influence the future of our generation. In addition, Mimi did not include any critique on the article or the authors writing. Although Mimi could have made some improvements, I did learn a lot of new information concerning neurological research. One point that surprised me was how much money we are spending on this research a year. $4.5 billion is a lot of money, and I think it’s incredible that we've invested so much in this important study. Im sure there will be many revolutionary discoveries to come.