Benjamin Libet, Professor Emeritus of Physiology at the University of California, San Francisco, has devoted 30 years to researching the processes that occur in our conscious and sub-conscious minds.
He came to one of his most fundamental discoveries through a rather simple experiment in which he asked research volunteers to move their wrists at a time of their own choosing while they also observed a graphic on a computer of a dot moving around a clock face.
They were asked to note the exact time when they decided to move their wrist. It is important to note that they were to identify not when they moved their wrist, but when they first had the thought, ‘I am going to move my wrist now.’
They were hooked up to equipment that could detect their overall brain activity, so that a correlation could be made between when they thought about moving their wrist and the spike in brain-wave activity that corresponded with their making a decision and actually flexing their wrists.
The data gathered from the experiment revealed that on average their brain became more active about 200 milliseconds before they actually flexed their wrist. This in and of itself is not so surprising a result, as it takes about 200 milliseconds for the signals from the brain to get to the wrist to instruct it to move. However…
Professor Libet was also monitoring the specific area of the participants’ brains that was involved with controlling muscle movement, and this part of the brain showed a spike in activity 350 milliseconds before the participant became conscious of having made the decision to move his or her wrist. He called this the ‘readiness potential’ (see image here).
Other researchers were as startled by the results of this experiment as was Professor Libet. For example, Dr Gerald Zaltman, of Harvard Business School, said;
“This shows us that the areas of the human brain that involve choice are activated well before we become consciously aware that we have made a choice. That is, decisions happen before they are seemingly made!”
What Professor Libet has shown, and what Dr Zaltman is saying, is that our subconscious self is actually ‘in charge’.
That blows my mind! How about you?
Other researchers were as startled by the results of this experiment as was Professor Libet. For example, Dr Gerald Zaltman, of Harvard Business School, said;
“This shows us that the areas of the human brain that involve choice are activated well before we become consciously aware that we have made a choice. That is, decisions happen before they are seemingly made!”
What Professor Libet has shown, and what Dr Zaltman is saying, is that our subconscious self is actually ‘in charge’.
That blows my mind! How about you?
