A Race Against the Idiocracy

“I think we’re getting closer to harnessing neurogenesis to improve cognition and mood in humans. This research may also help explain a bit of a mystery in the field, which we still don’t understand, regarding how the hippocampus can be involved with both cognition – which is its classic function – and in mood and anxiety-related functions. Perhaps the fact that pattern separation affects both the cognitive and mood domains is the beginning of an answer to that paradox,” said Dr. Hen. _StemCells

René Hen, PhD, professor of Neuroscience and Pharmacology, in the Departments of Neuroscience and Psychiatry at Columbia University and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, has discovered a possible escape hatch by which some members of society might escape the Idiocracy. It involves the use of chemicals called "BAX inhibitors." Particular members of that class of drugs have the potential to preserve newborn stem cells in the brain's hippocampus. And doing that could make all the difference in the course of a person's life success and happiness.

After boosting the number of neurons in the hippocampus, an area of the brain involved in memory and mood, the researchers tested the mice in both learning and mood-related tasks and looked for changes in behavior. The researchers found specific effects on learning tasks that involve a process called pattern separation, which is the ability to distinguish between similar places, events and experiences.

“This process is crucial for learning because it enables us to know whether something is familiar or novel,” said Dr. Hen. “If it is familiar, you move on to the next bit of information; if it’s novel, you want to be able to recognize that it’s new and give it meaning. These mice, with just more adult-born neurons, and no other changes in the brain, basically learn better in tasks where they have to discriminate between similar contexts.”

Earlier strategies for manipulating neurogenesis, according to the investigators, were broader and less specific. “In addition to stimulating neurogenesis, these earlier methods exerted many other effects on the brain. As a result, you never knew with these older manipulations what’s due to neurogenesis, or what’s due to the other effects that these manipulations cause, and, indeed, what we find is that when you stimulate just adult neurogenesis, you actually get a subtle effect. Unlike broader manipulations, it does not affect all forms of learning, it’s very specific to tasks that require pattern separation,” said Dr. Hen.

Pattern separation is not only important for learning; it may also be important for anxiety disorders, including post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and panic disorder. People with PTSD, say the researchers, have a more generalized fear response, so that when they are placed in a situation that reminds them of even one aspect of their trauma, they frequently have a full fear response.

...The researchers say that the genetic strategy used to stimulate neurogenesis in their experiments can be mimicked pharmacologically, potentially leading to the development of new drugs to reverse pattern separation deficits. One such class of drugs the investigators are currently testing – BAX inhibitors – works by blocking cell death.

“These drugs are basically doing the same thing that we did with our genetic manipulation-namely, increasing the survival of the young neurons which normally undergo a process of cell death that eliminates at least half of these neurons. Now instead of dying, the neurons will go on to survive,” said Dr. Sahay.

Some BAX inhibitors have been developed for stroke research, where the goal has also been to prevent neurons from dying. The Columbia researchers plan to begin testing the BAX inhibitors in mice shortly. And if they produce cognitive benefits, the testing will be extended to clinical trials to determine if there’s also a beneficial effect in humans. _StemCells

This is all related to the length of time required before antidepressants are able to bring about a full "antidepressive response." The full effect of modern antidepressants requires new stem cell production in the hippocampus -- but that takes time to achieve. Drugs capable of rapid and prolonged increases of hippocampal stem cells could conceivably keep anxiety and depression at bay, while improving a person's cognitive capacity.

No, this is not NZT. As mentioned here previously, a drug that could achieve the effect of the fictional NZT would have to stimulate changes in gene expression on multiple levels, and across a wide range of brain centers.

Smart drugs alone will not achieve the goal of smarter, better-rounded, and happier humans. Educational and environmental interventions would also be necessary, to blunt the Idiocratic brainwashing effect of modern media, modern academia, and modern popular culture, while allowing the brain to develop newer, more functional pathways.

Realistically, it will take 15 years at the earliest to see the early promise of this type of medication come to fulfillment. But a single ray of hope in the distance is worth a lot to a person immersed in the modern rush to Idiocracy.

More 5April2001: An example of rapid brain plasticity in human adults
The PNAS Abstract from the actual study

The Limits of Smart Drugs

The Clear Pill
Why Smart Drugs Don't Work Like NZT

What are smart drugs? Pills that are supposed to enhance a person's cognitive abilities in some way. Anything from Ritalin to Amphetamines to Provigil might qualify, as well as a wide range of lesser known "nootropics."

These pills are not only popular among university students, but also among workers from truck drivers to pilots to fast-paced professionals who are pushing every synapse to its limit. They can enhance attention, prolong attention span, help keep the mind on topic. All very important when facing a deadline for a research paper, a big work project, or when cramming for an exam.

In one sense, advanced societies run on smart drugs. Western societies embraced coffee, tea, and chocolate as quickly as they could -- and significant battles were fought over the rights to market these early smart drugs.

Fast forward to today, and the "stimulant smart drugs" are being pumped onto the markets -- both legal and illegal -- at prodigious rates. But newer, more advanced generations of smart drugs may be on the horizon.

This Al Fin posting from 2007 is still one of the best summaries of the smart drug research pipeline I have found. Here is a more recent survey of the field from Gizmodo. Some of the newer drugs enhance attention, some enhance memory, some may enhance creativity.

But what about other approaches to getting smarter, besides drugs?

Instead of drugs, the first brain boosters to channel creativity could be electromagnetic devices designed to enhance cognitive skills. One fascinating proposal comes from Allan Snyder, director of the Centre for the Mind at the University of Sydney in Australia. He theorizes that autistic savants derive their skills from an ability to access “privileged, less processed sensory information normally inhibited from conscious awareness.” For normal people, tapping that sensory well might lead to deeply buried creative riches. To test the idea, Snyder and colleagues exposed subjects to low-frequency magnetic pulses (the technology is called transcranial magnetic brain stimulation, or TMS) that suppressed part of their brain function. The researchers found that the subjects acquired savantlike skills, including the ability to render more detailed, naturalistic art. _Discover

Electromagnetic stimulation of the brain probably has a great future ahead of it. But caution is always wise, when working in and around the brain.

All of these drugs -- past, present, and future generation -- are relative sledge-hammers compared to the intricate workings of the human brain. But the real reason smart drugs won't work like "NZT" (from the movie "Limitless") is because none of them can make the necessary changes in both function and structure, to turn mediocrity into brilliance. To do that it is necessary to tweak gene expression at multiple levels.

NZT is an idea whose time has come. But ideas can only take you so far. Converting this idea into a dynamic reality will take more than a little thought.

From an earlier posting at Al Fin, the Next Level

The Ultimate High?

Have you ever wondered why governments spend many $billions every year to restrict the mental states it allows its citizens to experience, while it spends nothing at all to develop ways for its people to get truly, safely high, and reach their ultimate potential?

The ultimate high is to be the perfect version of yourself. Smarter, stronger, faster, wiser, healthier, wealthier, more mobile, with an unlimited future, a great family, and a circle of smart devoted friends that just won't quit.

There is a reason why the mind-altering drug is such a huge blockbuster business worldwide. Most people don't like who they are enough to be able to resist the opportunity for a bit of chemical (external or internal) alteration. To take a hit of this or that -- anything to boost, to blunt, to make you forget, to help you remember.

Something most people may not think about often -- being too busy getting stoned, drunk, high, or wasted. But the new movie "Limitless" may bring the idea to light for at least a few weeks.

Bradley Cooper is Eddie, a struggling writer who takes a mysterious smart drug, and unsurprisingly gets smart. Name the mental power - Analytical, memory, strategic, creative - it's suddenly all there. _SMH

But strip away all the Hollywood glitz, drama, and titillation, and the underlying reality remains inside the brain of most people you know: people want something different, something more.

The smart thing for governments would not be to restrict chemical use, but rather to develop safe, enabling recreational drugs that don't give you a hangover, or otherwise leave you less capable in the aftermath. A better drug that you can drive under the influence of, copulate in the brilliant light of, socialise at the height of your untapped wit and wisdom all night long, then sleep soundly and wake refreshed and alert.

We are not talking about the next level here, just a more rational approach to a deep-seated need of humans to explore, experiment, and go further into the mystery and potential of their own selves. Up until now, that instinct has necessarily been diverted and perverted to mostly destructive and wasteful uses. But that would not be necessary under a wiser regime. (For example, there was no DEA or FDA in the original US Constitution....)

This is certainly not about something like Soma, the drug of choice for the alpha, beta...zetas of Huxley's Brave New World. Better drugs make you better...more, not less of who you could be.

Of course there are a lot of foolish, dystopic aspects to the world we inhabit -- far beyond idiotic drug laws and policies. It is even worse if you travel to the hinterlands of China, or -- heavens forbid -- North Korea. It is the belief of Al Fin sociohistorians that a better society grows from a better substrate of inhabitants. And a better substrate of inhabitants grows from an attitude and ethic of enhancing the potential of members of society. Bottom up, and top down at the same time. But wiser all around. And smarter.

More on this topic later.