full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Vilayanur Ramachandran: The neurons that shaped civilization

Unscramble the Blue Letters


But what Rizzolatti found was a subset of these neurons, maybe about 20 percent of them, will also fire when I'm looking at somebody else performing the same aiotcn. So, here is a neuorn that fires when I raech and grab something, but it also fires when I wtach Joe reaching and grabbing something. And this is truly astonishing. Because it's as though this neuron is adopting the other person's point of view. It's almost as though it's performing a virtual reality simulation of the other person's action.

Now, what is the significance of these mirror neurons? For one thing they must be involved in things like iitimtoan and emulation. Because to imitate a complex act requires my brain to adopt the other person's point of view. So, this is important for imitation and emulation. Well, why is that important? Well, let's take a look at the next slide. So, how do you do imitation? Why is imitation important? miorrr neurons and imitation, etolauimn.

Open Cloze


But what Rizzolatti found was a subset of these neurons, maybe about 20 percent of them, will also fire when I'm looking at somebody else performing the same ______. So, here is a ______ that fires when I _____ and grab something, but it also fires when I _____ Joe reaching and grabbing something. And this is truly astonishing. Because it's as though this neuron is adopting the other person's point of view. It's almost as though it's performing a virtual reality simulation of the other person's action.

Now, what is the significance of these mirror neurons? For one thing they must be involved in things like _________ and emulation. Because to imitate a complex act requires my brain to adopt the other person's point of view. So, this is important for imitation and emulation. Well, why is that important? Well, let's take a look at the next slide. So, how do you do imitation? Why is imitation important? ______ neurons and imitation, _________.

Solution


  1. imitation
  2. watch
  3. reach
  4. mirror
  5. action
  6. neuron
  7. emulation

Original Text


But what Rizzolatti found was a subset of these neurons, maybe about 20 percent of them, will also fire when I'm looking at somebody else performing the same action. So, here is a neuron that fires when I reach and grab something, but it also fires when I watch Joe reaching and grabbing something. And this is truly astonishing. Because it's as though this neuron is adopting the other person's point of view. It's almost as though it's performing a virtual reality simulation of the other person's action.

Now, what is the significance of these mirror neurons? For one thing they must be involved in things like imitation and emulation. Because to imitate a complex act requires my brain to adopt the other person's point of view. So, this is important for imitation and emulation. Well, why is that important? Well, let's take a look at the next slide. So, how do you do imitation? Why is imitation important? Mirror neurons and imitation, emulation.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
human beings 4
motor command 3
mirror neurons 3
mirror neuron 3
literally feel 3
human brain 2
nerve cells 2
command neurons 2
sudden emergence 2
simply watch 2

ngrams of length 3

collocation frequency
motor command neurons 2

Important Words


  1. act
  2. action
  3. adopt
  4. adopting
  5. astonishing
  6. brain
  7. complex
  8. emulation
  9. fire
  10. fires
  11. grab
  12. grabbing
  13. imitate
  14. imitation
  15. important
  16. involved
  17. joe
  18. mirror
  19. neuron
  20. neurons
  21. percent
  22. performing
  23. point
  24. reach
  25. reaching
  26. reality
  27. requires
  28. rizzolatti
  29. significance
  30. simulation
  31. slide
  32. subset
  33. view
  34. virtual
  35. watch