You Can Grow Your Intelligence: Article Analysis

Even though within this small universe the human brain has a substantial size of around 3 pounds and compared to an elephant 13 pounds which is a lot heavier, elephants are very intelligent species. There are several known factors within the genotypes that have been associated with determining how conclusive intelligence is within the human brain through IQ, based on human sex male or female, or the typical order of birth. The cerebellum which lies within the brain stem transmits messages throughout the body and the brain and this is an essential part to what leads to building the intelligence within individuals.

Stanford students possess an intellectual vitality. Reflect on an idea or experience that has been important to your intellectual development. (250 word limit)*

Military intelligence is the gathering, evaluation and interpretation of information concerning the enemy or an area. Under the military intelligence branch (MI) there are several MOS’s or jobs for both officers and enlisted personnel. The selected MOS for this interview was 35M which is a Human Intelligence Collector.

From reading “You Can Grow Your Brain” I was able to make a personal connection

All throughout earthly time, scientists and researchers have been curious about neuroscience, and how the brain affects cognitive functions. Neuroscience, the study of the nervous systems function and structure is a complicated, and intense research for scientists. Learning about the thousands of different neurons, and all different aspects of the brain can be quite confusing. The comprehension of how exactly the brain works has yet to be figured out, but definitely research has progressed.

The Null Hypothesis is the thought that “all vertebrates (with the exception of humans) are of equal intelligence” (Pearce, 2008). The Null Hypothesis was proposed by Macphail (1982) and has since been widely debated; we will break these debates into six categories for further examination. Associative Learning

There is currently no proof that those with a larger brain are smarter than lose with a smaller brain.

In Stanley Coren’s, “Are Dogs More Intelligent than Cats?” the main question simply is, are dogs or cats smarter. Although the question is simple the solution is much harder to find. Different animals have different abilities so measuring the intelligence of a cat by having it move “from place to place, where speed is a measure of performance” (Coren) would not be logical. Since there is difficulty measuring an animal’s intelligence psychologists and biologists needed a new technique. The idea that the bigger the brain of an animal the smarter an animal is came into play. This had its flaws because this method claimed the “super geniuses” (Coren) would be whales who have a larger brain mass than human beings. Finally in the 1970’s, Harry J. Jerison created the Encephalization Quotient. The Encephalization Quitient or EQ is a method that calculates an animal’s brain weight to its body size. With this method it was found that dogs have a higher EQ than cats do. The social interactions and higher demands on domestic dogs make them in fact smarter than the cat.

It seems as though the brain is the only organ that is immensely different from one person to another. The brain is so complex that it stands above other organs and creates our persona. Our experiences shape our brain. Our emotions, interactions, and connections generate the brain that dictates our everyday lives. The development of the brain intrigues me. Is it the complexity of humans that allow for a higher development of the brain? Are the minds of humans' on a separate plane than animals? Or a different space entirely? If we can communicate with dogs and the like, what would happen if the brains of animals elevated to our level of understanding? These are the questions that fill my brain. I want to learn how and why the brain acts as it does. I wish to understand the organ that dictates my

I put their conclusions to the researcher behind the social brain hypothesis, Robin Dunbar of the University of Oxford in the UK. He contests the findings.

In defiance of people regarding others with big heads to be smarter, no evidence have been found to back up this theory. In reality, it dosent matter, such as the brilliant physicist Einstein had a smaller brain that didn't age normally in fact it was the same as a mid 20 year olds even though he was 77 when he died. also, the only parts of the brain used for thinking are the outer skin or cortex of the forebrain or cerebrum. The cerebral cortex is the thick layer of tissue with multitudinous folds. unlike the grain size theory it's actually the number and depth of the folds in the cerebral cortex that determines your intelligence, no matter the species it could be an animal or a human all that matters is the number and deepness of the

In the study done in Friedman’s article, he says “...we can clearly enhance learning, even if mental gymnastics won’t make us smarter,” proving that although brains may not increase intelligence, they can maintain and continue to learn. Also, back to the beginning statement of “people exercise muscles,” in another study done, scientists found that doing exercises actually improved the growing of neurons in the brain due to a protein called “BDNF” being secreted (Friedman). BDNF improves memory, which would improve fact recollection in turn; most people may mistake fact and memory recollection for intelligence. Really, the only way people can prove that they get smarter depends on which definition they look at in a

Numerous individuals consider themselves as intelligent; this may be based on their IQ score or because they have graduated high school and maybe have a college degree. However, one does not just title, or label, themselves as intelligent without taking into consideration the whole perspective of how one can be intelligent both scholarly and personally. For example, being “book smart” versus “street smart”. We may be both or more one than the other, but do we really know everything? How to calculate the mileage from home to California without using maps.com, what time or day each President of the United States was born, or something as little as knowing how to tie a shoe. Not everyone knows this information by heart or memory. Going onto talking about hearts, what about love? How do we know if we are in love or if we love each other? How do we know if we are upset or mad? What do we do if we find ourselves in this wrap of emotions and cannot find a way out? Well, that is where our emotional intelligence (EI) comes into play. When we have emotional intelligence, or understand the concept, we can better understand how to go about our lives without breaking down because we are bottling everything up, or because we have lost everyone around us from wrongfully exploding our feelings. We may be the most intelligent people in the world, but does that mean that we know everything on how

During high school, I read world renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck’s research on achievement and success and I have been immediately fascinated by her growth versus fixed mindset findings. Dweck conducted research where she gave fifth graders problems that were too hard for them and monitored their reactions; some students understood that they weren’t good at the problems yet, but they would learn from the challenge. Other students felt their intelligence had been up for judgement and they didn’t believe they could improve so they failed. I became intrigued by why some students possess a view that intelligence is incremental based on effort and some believe that intelligence is unchanging. I came to the realization that I was one of the students with a fixed mindset and worked incredibly hard to adopt a growth mindset.

Due to failure of intelligence which led to September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, President George W. Bush created the Office of Homeland Security in October 2001 and later converted it to a full cabinet department with a bill signed in November 2002 (Zimmerman, 2011). Creation of the DHS falls into the overall Federal government goal of reducing loss of life and property during emergency and her continuous efforts to prevent constant and evolving threats for terrorism and natural disasters (Kemp, 2012). The stated mission of the department was to protect US territory from terrorist attacks, respond to increasing threats originating from both nature and humans (Zimmerman, 2011). For instance, the agency is responsible for prevent terrorism and enhance security, secure and manage U.S territorial borders, enforce and administer immigration laws, strengthen national preparedness and resilience, detection of nuclear, chemical, and biological threats to the homeland; protection of our national leaders through the Secret Service; training of federal law enforcement officers, etc. (Johnson, 2015).