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Neuroplasticity & mental forceThe Mind and The Brain: Neuroplasticity and the Power of the Mental Force Jeffrey Schwartz and Sharon Begley Harper Collins (2002) INTRODUCTION: This book discusses clinical practise that suggests that the conscious will can alter habits or compulsions that are driven by flaws in the structure of patients' brains. It is also suggested that the exercise of the conscious will can mould new structures in the brain to support an altered habituation. The author links this finding to Henry Stapp's version of quantum consciousness, in which the whole brain of the observer is put into superposition. As a psychiatrist treating patients with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) Schwartz became critical of the behaviourist based methods of treating OCD in the mid-to-late twentieth century. These methods claimed a 60-70% success rate, but it turned out that this impressive figure excluded up to 30% of patients who refused to undertake the treatment proposed in the first place, plus a further 20% that dropped out during the course of treatment. Research during the last twenty years has shown that specific brain structures are involved in obsessive compulsive disorder. The orbital frontal cortex, the caudate nucleus and the anterior cingulate gyrus were all found to be over active in OCD patients. Studies, notably those by E.T. Rolls at Oxford University, showed that the orbital frontal cortex acted as an error detector. It became very active when something was not in line with expectations, such as when an expected reward for an action was not delivered. Other studies involving card games showed that patients with damage to the underside of the frontal cortex did not show aversion to decks of cards that consistently produced poor results, in the way that normal controls did. This area of the frontal cortex is described here as an 'intuition generator'. The normal players never rationalised their aversion to the bad decks of cards, they just avoided them. Intuition or literally 'gut feeling', because the aversion could be felt at the visceral level, could in this case prove a better guide than reasoning. In contrast patients with damage to the lower frontal cortex continued to use the bad decks even when they had understood rationally that they were a bad risk. What was of interest to Schwarz was that error detection by the orbital frontal produced a sense of unease that was exactly the feeling that compelled OCD patients to continually wash their hands etc. The anterior cingulate was also implicated in this. The difference between the subjects of the gambling study and the OCD patients was that the gamblers had an underactive frontal area that failed to give then an intuitive warning, while the OCD patients had an over active area that gave them repeated and largely unnecessary warnings. Another area that studies showed to be over active in OCD patients was the striatum, comprising the caudate nucleus and the putamen. All areas of the cortex and parts of the thalamus and the brain stem project to the striatum, and notably prefrontal areas concerned with planning behaviour have strong connections here. Small clusters of these prefrontal projections are known as matrisomes and are found near small patches of the striatum known as striosomes. The striosomes receive input from the prefrontal and in particular from the orbital frontal and anterior cingulate that are implicated in OCD, and also receive direct input from the amygdala, which is particularly involved in the experience of fear. Thus the striatum and particularly the caudate nucleus are an area of intermingling of emotional and rational input. In the mid 1990s researchers discovered specialised neurons referred to as tonically active neurons (TANs) that are situated where matrisomes and striosomes meet, and are therefore well placed to integrate emotional and rational input. TANs respond strongly to reward-linked stimuli. TANs also responded when a previously neutral stimuli becomes associated with a reward. TANs are thought to be involved in the development of habits, with particular environmental cues having emotional meaning and producing particular behaviour. Schwarz was unusual among 20th century researchers in thinking that as part of therapy the exercise of the conscious will could alter the responses or gating patterns of the TANs. He explained to OCD patients that their drives to hand wash etc. did not belong to 'them', but were an objective malfunction of part of their brain. This enabled some patients to consciously resist the impulses, because they were now perceived as an alien intrusion. Beyond this patients were encouraged to use the conscious will to refocus attention onto something other than the intrusive urge to a compulsive behaviour. This approach proved quite effective. The ability to alter such brain-based compulsive behaviour by use of the conscious will to focus on other activities, and to eventually use neuroplasticity to change the actual functioning and structure of the brain raised for Schwarz the whole question of the efficacy of consciousness, against a background where most researchers reject the efficacy of the conscious will. Schwarz bases his view of the conscious will and its efficacy on Henry Stapp's theory of quantum consciousness. This in turn was influenced by the work of von Neumann. Stapp was particularly critical of the 'don't think, calculate' approach which allowed science to ignore the implications of quantum theory. Stapp's view of quantum theory is that while the output of measuring devices was random, the observer has a role in choosing the questions that are put to nature. The observer's conscious thoughts are instrumental in posing the question without which nothing can happen. This is where the ideas of von Neumann and the way in which he departed from Bohr's Copenhagen interpretation come in. Bohr had assumed that the measuring instruments and the observers could be described by classical physics, but von Neumann proposed that the measuring devices and the human brains of the observers were in superposition as well as the quantum wave. In this theory, the brain of the observer is in a quantum superposition, which collapses when the measurement is made. Here the entire brain of an observer is in a quantum state. The quantum brain state evolves deterministically until a conscious observation of a measurement occurs. The only freedom for the observing brain lies in the initial choice of question to put to nature. Stapp thinks that this choice does affect the dynamics of the brain involved. I think that the main interest of Schwarz's work lies in the evidence that conscious volition can alter behaviour, and further more alter it through the neuroplasticity of identifiable structures and processes in the brain. I find it quite hard to live with aspects of the Stapp interpretation. Brains and measuring equipments in superposition conflicts with most ideas about decoherence. Even if it is argued that there is no wave function collapse as such, there are observable features of quanta in superposition that are never observed in brain-sized objects. Even if we accept this type of superposition there is a further problem with the question posing function ahead of the deterministic evolution of the quantum wave. What is it that poses the question? Quantum theory as more usually described gives answers about the properties of quanta, but does not provide the questions. In the end there seems to be an over-arching questioner not instantiated in any physical thing, and therefore presumably a dualistic entity, with the philosophical problems that that brings in its train. |
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