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Ian Logan
UWRT 1102-010
Dr. Rand
3/30/2015
Inquiry Project

Who Will Win?

The room suddenly goes dark. A little light tries to illuminate the entire auditorium from a
little room behind the audience. Right before the audiences eyes could adjust to the dark,
numerous, colorful lights illuminate and start moving in circles. Out of nowhere music starts
playing and the stage springs to life once more as everybody in the room again focuses on the
host of the show.
Andddddd..were back! Ladies and gentlemen welcome back to the final episode of
Whos the Next Little Einstein? Im Eric Waldridge, your host, and we are down to the finale!
These last two contestants have outmanned, outgunned, and outmaneuvered their competition up
to this point but dont forget that a slight alteration was made to tonights rules. Since it is the
finals, we allowed the last two participants to bring their school backpack with them filled with
any level textbook or paper. Hopefully they will take advantage of the help as this one is for all
the marbles!
You all remember how we got this far. We started with hundreds of kids from every town
and city across the country looking for the best and brightest of todays youth. They went head to
head against each other, seeing who was the most knowledgeable in the different areas of life. I

tell you what, its amazing what these kids know at such an early age. I am blown away every
single time by the amount of information they have in their little noggins. And now weve
eliminated all but the final two contestantsLittle Johnny and Mary Jane. Johnny, a short blondehaired boy of thirteen, is from Boring, Oregon. Fun fact, this city has a little more excitement in
it than the name implies. Hahaha. I am a little shocked to see Johnny in the finals, I must say. He
was not my first pick to still be here, but he definitely wasnt my last! Mary Jane, his opponent,
comes from the Big Apple and really set the standard. Her track record is practically flawless;
she easily beat all of her competition to claim her spot here in the finals. She will definitely be
hard to beat as she just blew us all away with her answer to, How can Congress and the Senate
improve the American government? Outstanding, I did not know a girl of her age knew the inner
workings of politics like that. It will be interesting to see how Little Johnny responds to the
question I about to present him. Does he have what it takes to beat his competition? Or will Mary
Jane finish with a clean sweep and claim the title? Lets find out! Johnny, your question is, is the
human brain limited?
Funny you should ask that, Mr. Eric. My English teacher assigned my class that very
question; and I just finished writing that paper a little while ago. I think I still have a copy of it
here in my backpack. Just give me one secondyep. Here it is. Ahem.
(Below is a copy of Johnnys paper.)

Johnny Applecore
March 20, 2015
Elementary English

Is Our Brain Limited or Limitless?

The brain is an extremely powerful organ. It not only stores what we see, hear, taste, and
touch for use later in life, but it also gives us new ideas, thoughts, and inventions. As we grow
up, we can wrap our minds around and understand more intricate and complicated concepts.
What other body part has this kind of functionality? Nothing. As time continues to progress,
mankind has invented and created more complex machines thanks to knowledge ad
understanding courtesy of the brain. Our minds have imagined previously unheard of stories and
numerous people have fallen in love with the things our minds have brought out of the shadows
and into existence. However, will we ever reach our capacity to what we can comprehend and
store? Will we ever reach a point where anything and everything has already been thought of by
another person?
A decent amount of Americans may think that humans only use ten percent of their brain.
If we want to understand more and increase our capacity, we would simply need to tap into that
unused ninety percent. That would be the answer if that fallacy were true. However, that myth
has somehow circulated into the minds of many people and deceived them. Barry Gordon at
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore disputes this misconception by saying [W]e
use virtually every part of the brain the brain is active almost all the time (Boyd). This widely
known fact is simply not true.
However, the brain does technically have a limit. Even though the brain is made up of
small units, it is not infinite. Converting to modern storage terms, the brains memory storage
capacity...[is] something closer to around 2.5 petabytes (or a million gigabytes) (Reber).
However, despite having a cap on the capacity of the brain, people will not come close to
utilizing that much of their brain. However, other things will, in fact, limit our ability to

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potentially come close to using all of that storage (Poldrack). These include sleeping and aging.
Sleep actually cleans out the brain of unimportant memories (Weller). Sleep-deprived brains
are, on average, smaller in volume and less populous in brain cells (Weller). Sleep also limits
the number of hours we are awake, which reduces the number of memories we will store in our
brain (Poldrack). In short, sleep recharges the brain and gets it ready for the next day. In
addition, aging also reduces the reaction of the brain. In fact, for every 15 years after age 24,
cognitive speed dropped by about 15% (Park). As people get older, their brains wear out and
take more time to process their surroundings and make decisions. The more time spent
processing means that it will not store as much information. With other things limiting it, the
brain cannot reach its maximum capacity.

What about trying to alter the brain to go above and beyond that limit? Is there a way to
make a super brain? Scientists have actually done extensive research on this topic. They too
wonder whether or not they can expand upon the human brain. For instance, Thomas Hills from
the University of Warwick and Dr. Ralph Hertwig from the University of Basel looked into this
subject. They concluded that people cannot have their cake and eat it too when it comes to more
brain functions. People with higher IQs, better memories, or savant like tendencies have a good
chance of suffering from a disorder. There is an exchange when it comes to higher brain
function, and one person cannot possess all of the cool brain functions currently known to man
(University of Warwick).
Biologically, Our brain can pack in only so many neurons; our neurons can establish
only so many connections among themselves; and those connections can carry only so many
electrical impulses per second (Fox 8). Basically, there is a limit to our brain. If the brain were
enlarged to hold more neurons, the processing speed would be slower. If more links were made
between the neurons, the amount of energy consumed would be too high. If neurons could be

shrunk down, then more could be packed into the existing space. However, smaller neurons tend
to misbehave at that size. There is always some type of exchange when it comes to possible
enhancement for the brain (Fox 7). Although humans may be able to find a way to enhance one
characteristic of the brain, they would need to compromise and give up another function in order
to attain that result. In short, if we wanted to alter the makeup of the brain to improve it, there
would be some loss of functionality in at least one area.
Since there is a cap on what we can put into the brain, and there is no clear way to alter it
for the better, what about what we can get out of it? Is there a limit on the ideas we can come up
with? Will our creativity ever run out? As long as people continue to produce offspring,
humanitys creativity will not run dry. After all, children are a lot more creative than adults.
Since kids have not learned all of the rule of the world, they do not know the possible from the
impossible. Anything and everything can happen in their mind (Sloane). Additionally, in the past
couple of centuries, the amount of inventions brought to life and the amount of research
performed on practically, if not, every subject has increased exponentially. From the creation of
the engine to the microchip, humans have figured out many new gizmos to help accommodate
their lifestyle and make it easier. Another rather recent invention is the fantasy genre. People
have invented superheroes, galaxies, worlds, and peoples from their imagination. Since this
genre does not have to follow the rules applicable on earth, almost anything goes. With such a
loose restriction, the possibilities are endless as to what people can come up with and materialize
either in a book or movie. Titles such as Alice in Wonderland, The Lord of the Rings, and Harry
Potter have become immensely popular and attract numerous readers. These particular titles have
even been casted into movies and gained ever more popularity. To put it briefly, if someone was
a child and has a brain, they can imagine something not yet created and keep the creative cycle

going. Since it does not matter what the idea is, anything goes, there can never be a limit as to
what can come from a human brain. Granted, it may become harder to think of an original idea.
However, just because something is hard does not mean it is impossible.
After looking at both what can go into a brain and what comes out of it, I would say there
are some thresholds we cannot cross, but not everything is limited. Just because there may be a
mental cap on the amount of intelligence one person can attain does not mean that is the end of
the road. There are other possibilities. As the years go on, people continue to write books and
think of new stories and characters. As the list of good books grows, so does humanities
creativity. So there is not one single answer to the question, do we have mental limits. Rather, the
question must be broken down into parts in order to accurately give the most complete answer.
(End of Johnnys paper.)
Wow. Folks, I think I just heard a masterpiece. After reading his work, I think Little
Johnny has an excellent chance of winning this competition. After all, this is Whos the Next
Little Einstein? And I am Eric Waldridge. Why would I expect anything less than the greatest
from our final two contestants? I am blown away that a kid that young was able to orchestrate the
words on the page in that manner. I dont know why I doubted Johnnys ability, but my, oh my, I
was gravely mistaken! Judges, I now turn the decision over to you. What will you decide? Who
will win?

Works Cited

Sloane, Paul. Why are Children so much more Creative than Adults?. destination innovation.
www.destination-innovation.com/articles, 2015. Web. 30 Mar. 2015.
University of Warwick. "Human brains unlikely to evolve into a 'supermind' as price to pay
would be too high." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, LLC 7 Dec. 2011. Web. 31 Mar. 2015
Boyd, Robynne. Do People Only Use 10 Percent of Their Brains?. Scientific American.
Scientific American, a Division of Nature America, Inc. 7 Feb. 2008. Web. 13 Mar. 2015

Fox, Douglas. The Limits of Intelligence. Grochbiology.com. Scientific American Jul. 2011.
Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Weller, Chris. Sleep Deprivation Kills Brains Cells, Shrinks Organ In Size: Rest Up And Stay
Smart. IBT Media Inc. 1 Oct. 2014. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Park, Alice. Our Brains Begin to Slow Down at Age 24. Time Magazine. 15 Apr. 2014. Web.
31 Mar. 2015.
Poldrack, Russell. How much can a person learn in a lifetime?. Society for Neuroscience. 25
Jul. 2012. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Reber, Paul. What Is the Memory Capacity of the Human Brain?. Scientific American, a
Division of Nature America, Inc. 1 Apr. 2010. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.