Do Humans use their

Brains to the Fullest

Potential?
By: Darrin Lowe
What does the myth suggest?
Humans only use a small portion of their brain when going through certain
tasks
Trauma to the brain is not as serious because of the small percentage of the
brain that is actually being used
Unlocking and activating more parts of your brain will give you higher
cognitive ability
While we sleep, parts of our brain become unlocked which is why dreams
are highly creative and complicated





Limitless
A movie that depicts that the brain is not fully activated when humans are
going through everyday tasks
~10% of your brain is being used at any given moment
The portions of the brain that arent active cannot be activated unless a
performance enhancing pill NZT-48
Depicts what life would be like when your brain is completely activate
At the beginning he is in a midlife crisis on the borderline of losing everything
On the drug, all of his problems drifted away with his higher cognitive functions,
and his life couldnt be better
How much of our brain is used on a
typical day?
With all of the different parts of the brain being activated many times during
the day, it is highly likely that your 100% of your brain is being used everyday.
Our brains are divided into many different regions that serve different
functions. For example, your eyes are directly connected to several specific
parts of your brain.
Thomas Cleland, Neuroscientist (ccmr.cornell.edu)
Times when your brain isnt working at top performance
Relaxing
Sleeping
Daydreaming

Every part of the brain is important!
Different parts of our brain has specific functions that it is supposed to carry
out.
Frontal Lobe Higher cognition, motor skills, and reasoning
Occipital Lobe Sight; Information obtained by eyes can be recognized as an
object
Any kind of damage to the brain can be detrimental to some kind of cognitive
function.
The typical patient loses 1.9 million neurons each minute in which stroke is
untreated.
- Jeffrey L. Saver, MD (stroke.ahajournals.org)
Inception
Your brain can only reach its fullest potential while you are asleep
They say we only use a fraction of our brain's true potential. That's when
we're awake. When we're asleep, our mind can do almost anything.
- Dominick Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio)
Information in this movie was obtained through a persons dream and can be
used in the real world
The mind cannot be nearly as sophisticated or creative unless the person is
sleeping


During Sleep
The brain does not simply stop working when you sleep
There are 5 stages of sleep: 1, 2, 3, 4, and REM
Your brain goes through a repair and maintenance for the body when the REM stage
is achieved
Sleep does not unlock areas of your brain that were not available when you
were awake
It is true that there are no boundaries to the human mind, so it is easier to be
creative while you are sleeping
This does not add on to what you are already capable of doing
What actually keeps humans from using
100% of their brain?
Neurological Diseases
Parkinsons Disease
Stroke
Dementia
Brain Trauma Anything external that can effect the brain
Car Accidents
Concussions
Research that has been tested on brain
usage

References Page
http://stroke.ahajournals.org/content/37/1/263.long
http://www.ccmr.cornell.edu/education/ask/index.html?quid=1260