![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Some emotions which we may want to discourage in ourselves, like anger, can also be potentially very useful to us, though. The thinking brain can override these automatic responses, but it requires a lot of energy and focus, he says. "The brain has the habit of taking the easy option because everything else costs it resources." The reptilian side is so powerful because it requires much simpler processing and gets into gear a lot faster, Burnett says. "The neocortex is constructing and navigating our complex society with all our friends and our work and our jobs and our ambitions and dreams and drives and this fundamental part of our brain which is thinking there's a wolf around every corner and this meal might be your last."ĭean Burnett, author of The Idiot Brain Photo: Suppliedīut why has the brain not evolved to be less reptilian (or reactive) in situations that don't require fight or flight? It is where language processing, creativity, rationalisation, imagination, and perception take place and is responsible for the creation of our complicated high-tech human world. The neocortex ("the big wrinkly bit right at the top") is the part that makes us smart. It is pre-rational, easily triggered, deeply entrenched and so reactive as to be almost automatic. The reptile brain, which is what keeps us alive, has been unchanged for millions of years. Part of that feeling we get that our brain is working against us is because two parts of our brain - the reptile brain and the neocortex - are essentially living in different worlds, Burnett says. ![]()
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