Neura 2: Inside Your Brain: The Three Riders of Decision-Making
Welcome to Neura, a series that delves into the intriguing world of the brain and neuroscience.
Traditionally, it is presumed that humans are rational decision-makers, engaging in the evaluation of situations, absorption of information, processing, and ultimately arriving at an optimal decision. However, this mirrors the way AI operates. In fact, our decisions are affected even by having a good meal or enjoying our time with family or friends. Or you can simply be convinced by an idea just because of its articulation or eloquence, which we call it persuasion (1)
In the previous article (2) we explored the idea that the brain is more than a computer that stores memories and record information as data. In fact, human brain is a living organ that is consistently reshaping and reconfiguring itself by interacting with the world.
Hence, our decisions making process is more complicated and deeper than we think. Unlike computers, the brain runs on conflicts between different possibilities each one of them is supported by a group of networks in your brain. As a result of ongoing conflicts in the brain, we argue with ourselves. In other words, decision making is merely a conflict between a different part of you. A good example to illustrate this conflict, you can see to the picture bellow.
In the picture we can see a young lady staring away, right? Now try to find the old woman who’s looking down to the left. Once you found the old woman in the figure, you would see one version, then eventually the other, and so on. So, it has to be something changed inside your brain.
In theory, your brain should be able to see them both, but in reality, your brain does not do this.
Neuroscientists explain this switch in the perceptual decision that your brain take as a change in your network’s patterns. According to David Eagleman is his book, The Brain the Story of You, published in 2015, sometimes neurons change their patterns of activity in more subtle ways, becoming synchronized of desynchronized with other neurons even while maintaining their original pace. As consequence, the change in the picture is merely a reflection of changing patterns taking place in your brain.
In the light of this experience, it is crucial to mention that your brain is making thousands of decisions every day from waking up, to going to the gym, work, and so on. These decisions, even though seem obvious they are the result of conflicts between many areas in your brain.
In order to understand the process of the decision in your brain, it is important to determine the main leaders of these conflict. First, emotion.
Emotion: The trolly dilemma
Why it is easy to launch a bomb but not easy to push someone under a train?
Imagine the following scenario: a carriage is traveling under a train on a train track, out of control. Four workers make repairs along the track, and you stand next to a crane that can move the cart to another track. But the problem is! You realize there is one factor on this path. So, if you pull the lever, you will kill one worker, and if you grab it, you will kill four. What will you do in this case? More often than not, many of us, if not all of us, will push the lever and sacrifice one instead of four.
Now consider a slightly different scenario, where the four workers would be killed. But this time, you’re standing on the roof of a water tower overlooking the parking lot, and you notice a man standing there with you. She realized that if she pushed him, he would land directly on the track and his body would stop the cart and save the lives of the four men. Are you going to push him away? The answer is no. In this scenario, you do not accept the mathematical logic: trading one life for four.
According to neuroscientists, the brain in the first scenario is solving a mathematical problem. However, in the second scenario, you would physically interact with the man and puh him to death, which involves other networks in the decision making, emotions.
The second scenario places your brain in a conflict between two regions and sets of networks with differing opinions. To be sure, rational networks assume that taking one life to save four is right. However, you won’t, because the second area is strong in this scenario: killing someone is wrong.
When someone presses a button to launch a missile, all it takes is rational thought. Operating the bomb can be like a video game. In this context, I quote David Eagleman.
The detached nature of distance warfare reduces internal conflicts, making easier to wage.
Another leader involved in the conflict of decision making is what very often motivates you to go to the gym or to take your children outside: the reward.
It is worth noting that all our decisions, in one way or another, involve our past, to predict the future, or in other words, reward.
All creatures are programmed to receive a reward as a result of any decision they make. People go to school or a job they don’t necessarily like, and wake up every day because they’re looking for a better future as a reward, maybe a promotion or a degree.
Consider this scenario, you have free time today and are trying to choose between four options: watch a movie, clean your house, go shopping, or go out with your friends. In order to make a decision, your mind will make you live these four scenarios in the future, based on your past experiences. Your final decision will be the most valuable reward for you. Yet, this is not the complete process. Let’s think that the last time you went out you weren’t having a good time, yet your mind evaluated that option the last time. In fact, your evaluation of everything is subject to change based on the experiences you have had.
Your brain builds a new evaluation of a given situation based on recent feelings and the reward you received the last time you made that decision.
How this works? Dopamine. Therefore, the second key player in your brain’s daily conflicts is dopamine.
The third leader in your brain’s conflicts, is what children used to say: I want it NOW: The power of now.
To the brain, the future has the possibility of not happening, and what is real is what you are experiencing now, in this moment. The power of now explains why people make decisions that seem good in the moment but have bad consequences in the future: alcohol, drugs, video games, food, food, all these people make these decisions even though they know they shouldn’t. The main driver of this force is hormones.
Of the three areas involved in the decision-making process, this is the most dangerous area that must be controlled.
Can we do something about it? Well, business coaches, psychologists, neuroscientists, and entrepreneurs all know the element of this strength: discipline.
In the next article, we will continue our journey and delve deeper into how we harness the power of now by Discipline. Stay tuned as we unravel more mysteries of the mind and navigate the intricate landscape of the brain.
