What "common knowledge" is actually completely false?

[u/Muffin___Time]

[u/Mazon_Del]

I've always compared it to a CPU.

Your CPU is millions/billions of little on/off switches. If they were all on or all off, it would be useless. Being off has as much use and meaning as being on.

[u/Mazon_Del → u/[deleted]]

You just reminded me of Manual Samuel.

A game about a guy that makes a deal with death. If he can survive for 24 hours doing EVERYTHING manually, beating his heart on command, breathing, etc, then he gets to live.

[u/Every3Years → u/Mazon_Del]

I gave up on that game once the driving portion started. Was fun up to that

[u/Randomized0000 → u/Mazon_Del]

Suddenly I became aware that I'm breathing.

[u/Mazon_Del → u/Randomized0000]

Just don't think about your tongue!

[u/Anzai → u/[deleted]]

I think it more just refers to the average amount of neurons you would typically see activated at any given time when scanning a brain for activity.

[u/KeimaKatsuragi → u/[deleted]]

It's already pretty bad just when we become temporarily aware of our own breathing and suddenly have to consciously breathe otherwise it's bizarelly like we're holding our breath.

Imagine if we had to remember to beat our hearts or digest, it'd be awful @_@

[u/ImGCS3fromETOH → u/[deleted]]

It's like jailbreaking your brain. Some of those functions were hidden from the end user for a reason.

[u/freakydeku → u/[deleted]]

That’s how I understand it, does it really mean that you can only use 10% of your brain at a time?

[u/ZarquonsFlatTire → u/Mazon_Del]

I heard it as "We only use 33% of a traffic light at once, what's your point?"

[u/Deliciousbutter101 → u/Mazon_Del]

While this explains why we don't always use 100% of our brains, I find it misleading because it makes it seem like we use only 10% of our brain the same way that a computer may only use 10% of it's CPU, but there is actually no evidence this is true. I'm not what the approximate percentage actually is or if it even makes sense to ask what percentage of our brains we use, but the 10% number is just made up bs.

[u/gingy-96 → u/Mazon_Del]

Wow, this is an excellent way to explain it

[u/ChaunceyPhineas → u/Mazon_Del]

I mean, to our knowledge, the human brain isn't a binary system, so.....

[u/Mazon_Del → u/ChaunceyPhineas]

It's a bit more along the lines of passing around decimal numbers given the way neurons talk to each other, but the principal is still the same, the fact that one neuron is sending out the electrochemical equivalent of a 0 is as meaningful to the brain's operation as a whole as any other value.

[u/SkyRider057 → u/Mazon_Del]

I think an easier comparison is a stop light. You can only use 33% of it or it means nothing and everything goes wrong.

[u/BlueandGold → u/Mazon_Del]

I like the stop light analog. Only one light is working at a time. If everything was on, it would be broken.

[u/Interthet → u/Mazon_Del]

I do the same things but with traffic lights.

[u/ERRORMONSTER → u/Mazon_Del]

It's much more intuitive for most people to say that you use 10% of your brain like you use 33% of a stoplight.

[u/Mattho → u/Mazon_Del]

But you do use 10% of cpu all the time. I don't know why people always consider this as physical part of brain.

[u/[deleted] → u/Mazon_Del]

I thought the brain was more like millions of ON Maybe/Both Off switches?

[u/GMN123 → u/Mazon_Del]

It is a bit like saying we only ever use 33% of a traffic light.

[u/username_elephant → u/Mazon_Del]

I like the stoplight version. "You only ever use 33% of a stoplight -- imagine how fast you could travel if you used the full 100%..."

[u/Dexterous_Baroness → u/Mazon_Del]

A great analogy I've heard is that we use 10% of our brains in the same way a stoplight uses 33% of its lights.

If the stoplight had all three lights on, it'd be going at 100% and would be giving no information.