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Daryl Bambic on 25 Feb 13

Tell me why this is credible.

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Is Anybody in There? Searching for Consciousness in an Injured Brain | Wired Science | ... - 2 views

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brain neuroscience consciousness

shared by Daryl Bambic on 13 Feb 13 - No Cached

eft to languish in nursing homes where no one bothers with physical therapy or even to check for glimmers of regained consciousness
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many patients with no outward signs of awareness retain some degree of consciousness
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In Wallis’ case, brain scans revealed evidence that his brain had rewired itself to some extent to compensate for the injury
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- Daryl Bambic on 13 Feb 13
  
  Brains re-wiring themselves is called brain plasticity.
  
  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">Brains re-wiring themselves is called brain plasticity. </div>
  
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y rare, a 2009 study by Belgian researchers found that 41 percent of hospital and rehab patients with a vegetative state diagnosis were actually minimally conscious
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ike a flickering light, and you’re going to miss it unless you systematically look for it,” Fins said.
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n a few cases, this technology has enabled rudimentary communication with patients trapped inside an unresponsive body. In the future, some scientists believe, it may be possible to directly decode these patients’ thoughts.
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- Daryl Bambic on 13 Feb 13
  
  For an explanation of how this decoding might work, go to the end of the article.
  
  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">For an explanation of how this decoding might work, go to the end of the article.</div>
  
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Getting these methods right is crucial, as pressure mounts to use them in medical decisions, including whether or not to terminate life support, and in the legal battles that sometimes ensue. There are a number of ongoing legal cases in Canada that involve vegetative or minimally conscious patients and end of life decisions, says Adrian Owen, a neuroscientist at the University of Western Ontario. “I’m absolutely sure fMRI is going to play a role in one or more of these cases in the next 12 months.”
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- Daryl Bambic on 13 Feb 13
  
  The role of technology in ethical decision making.
  
  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">The role of technology in ethical decision making.</div>
  
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technology that created these disorders in the first place.
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ut a badly damaged brain is not necessarily unconscious. The recent research tells us quite clearly that human consciousness is not binary. It can exist in degrees, fade in and out, even when the body is unresponsive.
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- Daryl Bambic on 13 Feb 13
  
  Consciousness is not binary but a question of degrees.
  
  <div class="cArrow"> </div><div class="cContentInner">Consciousness is not binary but a question of degrees.</div>
  
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wen also described a new way to assess mental function in unresponsive patients. It involves scanning someone’s brain as they watch an 8 minute clip of an Alfred Hitchcock film. When healthy people do this, various parts of the brain synchronize their activity at certain times in the clip. Owen argues that if brain injury patients exhibit similar patterns, it could be a telltale sign of residual cognitive function.
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imple yes-no communication probably isn’t enough to allow patients to participate in decisions about their care.
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Gallant’s lab has shown that it’s possible to reconstruct still images and video clips from the patterns of activity elicited in the brain of the person viewing them. If Gallant can see what your visual cortex is doing, he can tell you, more or less, what you’re looking at.
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