What podcasts say about David Eagleman
Every statement, with the speaker, the exact quote and the moment it was said.
What David Eagleman has said on podcasts
40 statements · 18 positive · 14 negative · 1 mixed · 7 neutral
Continual challenge keeps the brain changing through plasticity.
“if you're constantly pushing and challenging it with things it doesn't understand, then it'll keep changing”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 0:22
Experience, culture, language, and neighborhoods shape brain wiring.
“It's every bit of experience that you have. It's your culture, it's your language, it's your neighborhood. All of that stuff gets absorbed by the brain and wires us up.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 3:51
The brain constantly reconfigures itself throughout life.
“brain plasticity, for anyone who doesn't know, it's that the brain is constantly reconfiguring itself every second of your life”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 4:24
Neuroplasticity enables humans to build on previous discoveries.
“because we are able to figure out all the discoveries that have come before us because of this ability to reconfigure our own circuitry”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 5:32
Humans have roughly four times as much cortex as their nearest animal relatives.
“We have four times as much cortex as our nearest neighbors in the animal kingdom.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 6:34
Unused cortical territory is taken over by other tasks.
“nothing lies fallow in the brain. All that gets taken over for different tasks.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 9:59
Devoting more brain territory to a task improves performance.
“if you devote a lot of real estate towards something, you're going to get really good at it”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 11:03
Repeated practice produces exceptional skill.
“people get extraordinarily good by doing things over and over”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 16:52
Bilingual and trilingual children have lower vocabulary in each language on average.
“when children grow up, let's say trilingually or even bilingually, they end up having a lower vocabulary in both languages than if they grow up monolingually”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 17:35
On-demand information lets children learn when curiosity is high.
“what kids started getting a few decades ago was this opportunity to learn about something right when they were curious about it”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 19:38
Curiosity and engagement promote plasticity through neurotransmitter activity.
“brain plasticity really happens when you have the right cocktail of neurotransmitters present. And that cocktail happens to map onto curiosity or engagement.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 19:52
Children should prioritize critical thinking and creativity for uncertain future careers.
“the main things they can concentrate on, I think, are critical thinking and creativity”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 24:25
AI debates can expose students to multiple sides and reduce ideological capture.
“AI is terrific at this, this, and by the way, it's really important so that students get a 360 view of issues instead of ideological capture.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 25:13
Creativity consists of recombining existing knowledge in new ways.
“That kind of exercise is. That is creativity. That's all creativity is, is taking your storehouse of knowledge and doing remixes.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 26:02
Seeking novelty is the central strategy for maintaining brain plasticity.
“Two words, seek novelty. That's the whole game, is you gotta continually challenge the brain.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 29:01
Continued mental activity may compensate for Alzheimer's-related brain degeneration.
“they kept their brain active. So even as their brain was physically degenerating with Alzheimer's disease, they were building new roadways, they were building new bridges over these areas.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 30:29
Retirement without cognitive challenge is associated with poorer outcomes.
“people who retire at 65 and they go home and they sit on a couch and watch the television. They don't have as good an outcome because they're not challenging their brain anymore.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 30:44
Acetylcholine is likely the primary neuromodulator involved in plasticity.
“acetylcholine really feels to me like the main one involved in plasticity”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 34:08
Increasing dopamine can reduce risk aversion and promote risky behavior.
“when you crank up the dopamine, that changes your risk aversion such that people are taking”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 35:38
Complete infant-like plasticity would generally be undesirable for adults.
“I don't think we'd want the plasticity of an infant. Even though when you're doing, let's say, language learning, you say, oh, I wish I could learn this as well as I did when I was seven, but generally it's not a state that you would desire.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 38:32
People should not rely on their future selves to resist temptations.
“I don't think we can trust our future selves.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 48:15
Positive goals also benefit from external commitments and constraints.
“it's just as important with the positive things to hook things to that”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 49:13
Humans are generally poor at perceiving time accurately.
“we're actually quite terrible at it”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:06:47
Life-threatening situations do not increase perceptual processing speed.
“People do not see any faster in a life threatening situation.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:09:31
Slow-motion experiences during danger result from memory rather than perception.
“turns out this is all a trick of memory”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:09:48
Time seems to accelerate with age because fewer novel memories are formed.
“this is why time speeds up as we as we grow older”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:11:15
Attending to experiences and forming memories can make life seem longer.
“If we really attend to things and write down memories instead of letting life just wash over us, we can seem as though we've lived longer.”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:17:44
Addictive drugs can induce receptor increases through brain plasticity.
“addiction is all about brain plasticity. You put a certain drug in your system and what your brain does is it upregulates the receptors for that drug”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:26:02
Social media can produce addiction-like repeated use despite diminishing enjoyment.
“it has the characteristics of an addiction where you keep going back to it even though you're not getting the high from it that you did the first time”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:29:09
Deaf people can learn auditory perception through skin-based sensory substitution.
“deaf people could learn how to hear that way”
Open the episode · Science & Tools of Learning & Memory | Dr. David EaglemanListen at 1:31:29
Statements are attributed to the speaker as said on the episode and reflect their view at the time, not PodLume's. They are not advice.