Dr. David Eagleman

Yes, and it's a simple answer.

So if you go blind, the visual cortex at the back of the brain gets taken over by hearing and by touch and by other things.

In fact, our colleagues at Harvard did an experiment where they blindfolded normally-sighted people, and you could start seeing that takeover happening after 60 minutes.

And that's when we realized, wow,

The purpose of dreaming is to defend the visual territory from takeover from the other senses.

But what fascinates me about brain plasticity and what I've devoted my career to is figuring out the way that we can be the sculptors of our own brains and how it gives us an opportunity to become the kind of person we would like to be.

And can we do that?

Yes.

Here's the thing.

Your brain peaked at the age of two.

Okay, so at the beginning, you've got fluid intelligence, meaning you could learn anything.

But now that you have grown up in this world, you've got crystallized intelligence, meaning you know how to drive a car, you know how to operate a cell phone, you know how to run a business.

And so your brain doesn't require as much change, which means that the structure of the brain is always degenerating.

So this is something I've studied in my lab for decades now.

Well, I happen to be a cyber optimist for young people.

I think it's going to make them much smarter than the generation that came before.

And here's why.

When I was eight years old, I fell off of the roof of the house that was under construction.

And I fell 12 feet and broke my nose on the floor below.

But the whole thing seemed to take a long time.