Imagine that you invented a device that can record my memories, my dreams, my ideas, and transmit them to your brain. That would be a game-changing technology, right? But in fact, we already possess this device, and it's called human communication system and effective storytelling. To understand how this device works, we have to look into our brains. And we have to formulate the question in a slightly different manner.
Imaxinen que se inventase un aparato que puidese gravar os meus recordos, os meus soños, as miñas ideas, e trasmitilos aos seus cerebros. Sería unha tecnoloxía rompedora, non si? Pois o caso é que xa contamos con ese dispositivo, e chámase sistema de comunicación humana, un narrador efectivo. Para entender como funciona este dispositivo, temos que mirar dentro do noso cerebro. E temos que formular a pregunta dun xeito lixeiramente distinto.
Now we have to ask how these neuron patterns in my brain that are associated with my memories and ideas are transmitted into your brains. And we think there are two factors that enable us to communicate. First, your brain is now physically coupled to the sound wave that I'm transmitting to your brain. And second, we developed a common neural protocol that enabled us to communicate.
Temos que preguntar como os padróns de neuronas do meu cerebro asociados cos meus recordos e ideas se transmiten aos seus cerebros. E cremos que hai dous factores que nos permiten comunicarnos. O primeiro, os seus cerebros están agora fisicamente acoplados ás ondas sonoras que eu estou a transmitir cara a eles. E o segundo, desenvolvemos un protocolo neural común que nos permite comunicarnos.
So how do we know that? In my lab in Princeton, we bring people to the fMRI scanner and we scan their brains while they are either telling or listening to real-life stories. And to give you a sense of the stimulus we are using, let me play 20 seconds from a story that we used, told by a very talented storyteller, Jim O'Grady.
Como sabemos isto? No meu laboratorio en Princeton, levamos xente ao escáner de IRMf e escaneamos os seus cerebros mentres contan ou escoitan historias da vida real. Para que se fagan unha idea dos estímulos que usamos, permítanme que lles presente 20 seg dun dos relatos que usamos, narrado por un excelente contacontos, Jim O'Grady.
(Audio) Jim O'Grady: So I'm banging out my story and I know it's good, and then I start to make it better --
(Audio) Jim O'Grady: Estou a crear o meu relato e sei que vai ser bo, e entón empezo facelo mellor --
(Laughter)
(Risas)
by adding an element of embellishment. Reporters call this "making shit up."
engadindo elementos que o embelecen. Os xornalistas chámanlle a isto "inventar da nada".
(Laughter)
(Risas)
And they recommend against crossing that line. But I had just seen the line crossed between a high-powered dean and assault with a pastry. And I kinda liked it."
E aconsellan non cruzar esa liña. Pero veño de ver como se traspasaba entre un poderoso decano e un ataque cun pastel. E como que me gustou."
Uri Hasson: OK, so now let's look into your brain and see what's happening when you listen to these kinds of stories. And let's start simple -- let's start with one listener and one brain area: the auditory cortex that processes the sounds that come from the ear. And as you can see, in this particular brain area, the responses are going up and down as the story is unfolding. Now we can take these responses and compare them to the responses in other listeners in the same brain area. And we can ask: How similar are the responses across all listeners?
Uri Hasson: Ben, agora "miremos" nos seus cerebros e vexamos que pasa cando escoitan este tipo de relatos. Imos empezar polo fácil. Empecemos cun oínte e unha área cerebral: o córtex auditivo, que procesa os sons que chegan ao ouvido. Como poden ver, nesta área cerebral en particular, as respostas soben e baixan segundo transcorre o relato. Agora podemos coller esas respostas e comparalas coas doutros ouvintes na mesma área cerebral. E podemos preguntarnos: En que medida as respostas de todos os ouvintes son similares?
So here you can see five listeners. And we start to scan their brains before the story starts, when they're simply lying in the dark and waiting for the story to begin. As you can see, the brain area is going up and down in each one of them, but the responses are very different, and not in sync. However, immediately as the story is starting, something amazing is happening.
Aquí poden ver cinco ouvintes. Empezamos a escanear os seus cerebros antes de que empece o relato, cando só están deitados ás escuras, agardando que comece a historia Como poden ver, esta área cerebral vai arriba e abaixo en todos eles, pero as respostas son distintas, non están sincronizadas. Porén, en canto o relato comeza, ocorre algo asombroso.
(Audio) JO: So I'm banging out my story and I know it's good, and then I start to make it --
(Audio) JO: Estou a crear o meu relato e sei que vai ser bo, e entón empezo a...
UH: Suddenly, you can see that the responses in all of the subjects lock to the story, and now they are going up and down in a very similar way across all listeners. And in fact, this is exactly what is happening now in your brains when you listen to my sound speaking. We call this effect "neural entrainment." And to explain to you what is neural entrainment, let me first explain what is physical entrainment.
UH: Ei! De súpeto, poden ver que as respostas de todos os suxeitos se axustan ao relato, e agora soben e baixan de xeito moi parecido en todos os ouvintes. E, de feito, exactamente iso está a pasar agora nos seus cerebros mentres escoitan as miñas palabras. A isto chamámoslle efecto de "sincronización neural". E para explicarlles o que é déixenme primeiro explicar que é a sincronización física.
So, we'll look and see five metronomes. Think of these five metronomes as five brains. And similar to the listeners before the story starts, these metronomes are going to click, but they're going to click out of phase.
Miremos para estes cinco metrónomos. Imaxinen que son cinco cerebros. E igual que os ouvintes antes de que empezara o relato os metrónomos van soar, pero van facelo fóra de fase.
(Clicking)
(Tictacs)
Now see what will happen when I connect them together by placing them on these two cylinders.
Agora vexan o que pasa cando os poño en contacto poñendoos enriba destes cilindros.
(Clicking)
(Tictacs)
Now these two cylinders start to rotate. This rotation vibration is going through the wood and is going to couple all the metronomes together. And now listen to the click.
Agora os cilindros empezan a xirar. A vibración da rotación transmítese pola madeira e consegue acoplar todos os metrónomos. Escoiten agora o tictac.
(Synchronized clicking)
(Tictac sincronizado)
This is what you call physical entrainment. Now let's go back to the brain and ask: What's driving this neural entrainment? Is it simply the sounds that the speaker is producing? Or maybe it's the words. Or maybe it's the meaning that the speaker is trying to convey.
Isto é o que se chama sincronización física. Agora de volta aos cerebros, preguntémonos: Que é o que guía esta sincronización neural? Son, simplemente, os sons que produce o falante? ou tal vez son as palabras, ou se cadra é o significado que o relator tenta transmtir.
So to test it, we did the following experiment. First, we took the story and played it backwards. And that preserved many of the original auditory features, but removed the meaning. And it sounds something like that.
Para poñelo a proba, fixemos os seguintes experimentos. Primeiro, collemos o relato e reproducímolo ao revés. Isto preserva moitas das características auditivas orixinais, pero elimina o significado, e vén soando así:
(Audio) JO: (Unintelligible)
(Audio) JO: (Inintelixible)
And we flashed colors in the two brains to indicate brain areas that respond very similarly across people. And as you can see, this incoming sound induced entrainment or alignment in all of the brains in auditory cortices that process the sounds, but it didn't spread deeper into the brain.
Poñemos cores nos dous cerebros para indicar as áreas que responden de modo moi similar en todo o mundo. Como poden ver, este son induce a sincronización ou aliñamento en todos os cerebros nos córtex auditivos que procesan os sons, pero non se estende máis alá no cerebro.
Now we can take these sounds and build words out of it. So if we take Jim O'Grady and scramble the words, we'll get a list of words.
Agora podemos coller eses sons e construír palabras con eles. Se remexemos as palabras do relato de Jim O'Grady e sacamos unha lista de palabras.
(Audio) JO: ... an animal ... assorted facts ... and right on ... pie man ... potentially ... my stories
(Audio) JO: ... un animal... ... surtido de sucesos... e dereito home torta ... potencialmente... meus contos
UH: And you can see that these words start to induce alignment in early language areas, but not more than that. Now we can take the words and start to build sentences out of them.
E poden ver que estas palabras empezan a inducir un aliñamento nas áreas temperás da linguaxe, pero non máis alá. E agora collemos as palabras e empezamos a facer frases con elas.
(Audio) JO: And they recommend against crossing that line. He says: "Dear Jim, Good story. Nice details. Didn't she only know about him through me?"
(Audio) JO: E aconsellan non cruzar ese límite. Di: "Prezado Jim, Un bo conto. Fermosos detalles. Acaso ela non o coñecía só por min?
UH: Now you can see that the responses in all the language areas that process the incoming language become aligned or similar across all listeners. However, only when we use the full, engaging, coherent story do the responses spread deeper into the brain into higher-order areas, which include the frontal cortex and the parietal cortex, and make all of them respond very similarly. And we believe that these responses in higher-order areas are induced or become similar across listeners because of the meaning conveyed by the speaker, and not by words or sound. And if we are right, there's a strong prediction over here if I tell you the exact same ideas using two very different sets of words, your brain responses will still be similar.
UH: E agora poden ver que as respostas en todas as áreas lingüísticas que procesan a linguaxe entrante aparecen aliñadas ou semellantes en todos os oíntes. No entanto, só cando poñemos o relato completo, interesante, coherente as respostas espállanse mais no cerebro, nas áreas de orde superior, que inclúen o córtex frontal e o córtex parietal, e fan que todas elas respondan de xeito moi similar. E pensamos que estas respostas nas áreas de orde superior son inducidas ou se igualan en todos os ouvintes debido ao significado transmitido polo falante, e non polo son das palabras. E se estamos no certo, disto derívase unha sólida predición: se eu lles conto as mesmas ideas expresadas con diferentes palabras, as súas respostas cerebrais han ser similares.
And to test it, we did the following experiment in my lab. We took the English story and translated it to Russian. Now you have two different sounds and linguistic systems that convey the exact same meaning. And you play the English story to the English listeners and the Russian story to the Russian listeners, and we can compare their responses across the groups. And when we did that, we didn't see responses that are similar in auditory cortices in language, because the language and sound are very different. However, you can see that the responses in high-order areas were still similar across these two groups. We believe this is because they understood the story in a very similar way, as we confirmed, using a test after the story ended.
Para probalo, no meu laboratorio fixemos o seguinte experimento: Collemos o relato en inglés e traducímolo ao ruso. Así teñen dous sons e sistemas lingüísticos diferentes que transmiten o mesmo significado. E presentamos o relato en inglés aos ouvintes ingleses e o relato en ruso aos ouvintes rusos, e así podemos comparar as respostas nos dous grupos. E cando o facemos, non vemos respostas iguais nos córtex auditivos, nas áreas lingüisticas, porque a linguaxe e os sons son moi distintos. No entanto, poden ver que as respostas nas áreas de orde superior aínda son similares nos dous grupos. Cremos que isto se debe a que entenden o relato de xeito semellante, tal e como confirmamos pasándolles un test ao remate do conto.
And we think that this alignment is necessary for communication. For example, as you can tell, I am not a native English speaker. I grew up with another language, and the same might be for many of you in the audience. And still, we can communicate. How come? We think we can communicate because we have this common code that presents meaning.
E pensamos que este aliñamento é necesario para a comuniciación. Por exemplo, como vostedes perciben, eu non son un falante inglés nativo. A miña lingua materna é outra, e seguramente este é o caso de moitos de vostedes. E aínda así, podemos comunicarnos. Como? Podemos comunicarnos porque temos este código común que os presentes entendemos.
So far, I've only talked about what's happening in the listener's brain, in your brain, when you're listening to talks. But what's happening in the speaker's brain, in my brain, when I'm speaking to you? To look in the speaker's brain, we asked the speaker to go into the scanner, we scan his brain and then compare his brain responses to the brain responses of the listeners listening to the story. You have to remember that producing speech and comprehending speech are very different processes. Here we're asking: How similar are they? To our surprise, we saw that all these complex patterns within the listeners actually came from the speaker brain. So production and comprehension rely on very similar processes. And we also found the stronger the similarity between the listener's brain and the speaker's brain, the better the communication. So I know that if you are completely confused now, and I do hope that this is not the case, your brain responses are very different than mine. But I also know that if you really understand me now, then your brain ... and your brain ... and your brain are really similar to mine.
Polo de agora, só lles falei do que ocorre no cerebro do ouvinte, no seu cerebro, mentres escoitan o que lles conto. Pero que ocorre no cerebro do falante, no meu, cando lles falo? Para mirar no cerebro do falante, pedímoslle a este que se metese no escáner, escaneamos o seu cerebro e comparamos as súas respostas cerebrais coas dos ouvintes que estaban a oír o relato. Teñen que lembrar que a produción e a comprensión da fala son procesos moi distintos. E aquí preguntámonos: Canto se parecen? Para a nosa sorpresa, vimos que todos estes complexos padróns de resposta nos ouvintes en realidade veñen do cerebro do falante. Así que a produción e a comprensión asentan en procesos moi similares. E tamén atopamos que canto máis semellanza hai entre o cerebro do ouvinte e o do falante, mellor é a comunicación. Deste xeito, sei que se vostedes están agora totalmente confusos, e agardo que non sexa así, as súas respostas cerebrais serán distintas das miñas. Pero tamén sei que se realmente están a me entender, entón o seu cerebro... e o seu... e o seu... son moi similares ao meu.
Now, let's take all this information together and ask: How can we use it to transmit a memory that I have from my brain to your brains? So we did the following experiment. We let people watch, for the first time in their life, a TV episode from the BBC series "Sherlock," while we scanned their brains. And then we asked them to go back to the scanner and tell the story to another person that never watched the movie. So let's be specific. Think about this exact scene, when Sherlock is entering the cab in London driven by the murderer he is looking for.
Agora xuntemos toda esta información e preguntémonos: Como podo usala para transmitir un recordo meu desde o meu cerebro aos seus? Así que fixemos o seguinte experimento. Puxemos xente a ver, por primeira vez na súa vida, un capítulo da serie "Sherlock" da BBC, mentres escaneábamos os seus cerebros. Logo pedímoslles que volveran meterse no escáner e lle contaran a historia a outra persoa que nunca vira a serie. Concretemos. Pensen nesta escena, cando Sherlock entra en Londres no taxi conducido polo asasino que está a buscar.
With me, as a viewer, there is a specific brain pattern in my brain when I watch it. Now, the exact same pattern, I can reactivate in my brain again by telling the word: Sherlock, London, murderer. And when I'm transmitting these words to your brains now, you have to reconstruct it in your mind. In fact, we see that pattern emerging now in your brains. And we were really surprised to see that the pattern you have now in your brains when I'm describing to you these scenes would be very similar to the pattern I had when I watched this movie a few months ago in the scanner. This starts to tell you about the mechanism by which we can tell stories and transmit information. Because, for example, now you're listening really hard and trying to understand what I'm saying. And I know that it's not easy. But I hope that at one point in the talk we clicked, and you got me. And I think that in a few hours, a few days, a few months, you're going to meet someone at a party, and you're going to tell him about this lecture, and suddenly it will be as if he is standing now here with us. Now you can see how we can take this mechanism and try to transmit memories and knowledge across people, which is wonderful, right?
Se eu son o espectador, hai un padrón específico no meu cerebro cando a estou a ver. Pois podo reactivar ese mesmo padrón no meu cerebro de novo dicindo as palabras: Sherlock, Londres, asasino. E agora, cando transmito estas palabras aos seus cerebros, vostedes poden reconstruílo na súa mente. De feito, vemos estes padróns emerxendo nos seus cerebros. E quedariamos abraiados ao ver que o padrón que teñen agora nos seus cerebros cando lles describo estas escenas sería moi semellante ao que tiña eu mentres vía a película hai uns meses, dentro do escáner. Isto empeza a explicarlles o mecanismo polo que podemos contar historias e transmitir información. Porque, por exemplo, agora están a escoitar atentos e tratan de entender o que lles conto. E ben sei que non é doado. Pero agardo que nun momento dado na charla nos conectemos, e me sigan. E creo que dentro dunhas horas, uns días, uns meses, atoparán a alguén nunha festa, e falaranlle desta charla, e de súpeto, será como se esa persoa estivese agora connosco. Así poden ver como podemos usar este mecanismo e tratar de transmitirlles recordos e coñecementos á xente, o que é marabilloso, non si?
But our ability to communicate relies on our ability to have common ground. Because, for example, if I'm going to use the British synonym "hackney carriage" instead of "cab," I know that I'm going to be misaligned with most of you in the audience. This alignment depends not only on our ability to understand the basic concept; it also depends on our ability to develop common ground and understanding and shared belief systems. Because we know that in many cases, people understand the exact same story in very different ways.
Pero a nosa capacidade para comunicar aséntase na nosa capacidade para ter unha base común. Porque, por exemplo, se chego a usar o sinónimo "coche con condutor" no canto de "taxi", seguro que me perdería o aliñamento con moitos de vostedes, da audiencia. Este aliñamento depende non só da nosa capacidade para comprender o concepto básico; tamén da capacidade para desenvolver unha base común e entender e compartir o sistema de crenzas. Porque sabemos que en moitos casos, a xente entende de modos distintos a mesma historia.
So to test it in the lab, we did the following experiment. We took a story by J.D. Salinger, in which a husband lost track of his wife in the middle of a party, and he's calling his best friend, asking, "Did you see my wife?" For half of the subjects, we said that the wife was having an affair with the best friend. For the other half, we said that the wife is loyal and the husband is very jealous. This one sentence before the story started was enough to make the brain responses of all the people that believed the wife was having an affair be very similar in these high-order areas and different than the other group. And if one sentence is enough to make your brain similar to people that think like you and very different than people that think differently than you, think how this effect is going to be amplified in real life, when we are all listening to the exact same news item after being exposed day after day after day to different media channels, like Fox News or The New York Times, that give us very different perspectives on reality.
Para poñelo a proba no laboratorio, fixemos o seguinte experimento. Collimos un relato de J.D. Salinger, no que un home lle perde a pista á súa muller durante unha festa, e chama ao seu mellor amigo e pregúntalle, "Viches á miña muller?" Á métade dos suxeitos dixémoslles que a muller estaba a ter unha aventura co mellor amigo. Á outra metade, dixémoslles que a muller era fiel e o home moi ciumento. Esta única frase antes de empezar o relato abondou para que as respostas cerebrais dos que crían que a muller estaba a ter unha aventura fosen moi similares nestas áreas de orde superior e diferentes das do outro grupo. E se unha frase abonda para facer que os seus cerebros se parezan aos da xente que pensa coma vostedes e se diferencien de quen pensa distinto, pensen en como se amplificará este efecto na vida real, onde todos escoitamos exactamente as mesmas noticias despois de estarmos expostos día tras día a diferentes medios de comunicación, como os informativos da Fox ou o New York Times, que nos dan perspectivas moi distintas da realidade.
So let me summarize. If everything worked as planned tonight, I used my ability to vocalize sound to be coupled to your brains. And I used this coupling to transmit my brain patterns associated with my memories and ideas into your brains. In this, I start to reveal the hidden neural mechanism by which we communicate. And we know that in the future it will enable us to improve and facilitate communication. But these studies also reveal that communication relies on a common ground. And we have to be really worried as a society if we lose this common ground and our ability to speak with people that are slightly different than us because we let a few very strong media channels take control of the mic, and manipulate and control the way we all think. And I'm not sure how to fix it because I'm only a scientist. But maybe one way to do it is to go back to the more natural way of communication, which is a dialogue, in which it's not only me speaking to you now, but a more natural way of talking, in which I am speaking and I am listening, and together we are trying to come to a common ground and new ideas. Because after all, the people we are coupled to define who we are. And our desire to be coupled to another brain is something very basic that starts at a very early age.
Resumamos. Se todo funciona como planeei esta noite, usei a miña capacidade de vocalización para acoplarme cos seus cerebros. E usei este acoplamento para transmitir os meus padróns cerebrais asociados cos meus recordos e ideas aos seus cerebros. Con isto, empezo a revelar o mecanismo neural oculto polo que nos comunicamos. E sabemos que no futuro isto hanos permitir mellorar e facilitar a comunicación. Pero estes estudos tamén revelan que a comunicación asenta nunha base común. E como sociedade temos que preocuparnos de se perdemos esta base común e a nosa capacidade para falar coa xente que é lixeiramente diferente a nós porque deixamos que uns poucos e poderosos medios de comunicación teñan o control do micrófono, e manipulen e controlen a nosa forma de pensar. Eu non estou certo de como amañar isto, porque só son un científico. Pero tal vez un xeito de facelo sexa volver á forma mais natural de comunicación, que é o diálogo, que non son só eu falándolles a vostedes, senón unha forma máis natural de conversar, na que falo e escoito, e xuntos tratamos de chegar a unha base común e a novas ideas. Porque ao fin, as persoas coas que estamos acoplados definen quen somos. E o noso desexo de estar acoplados a outro cerebro é algo moi básico, que aparece a unha idade moi temperá.
So let me finish with an example from my own private life that I think is a good example of how coupling to other people is really going to define who we are.
Así que déixenme rematar cun exemplo da miña vida privada que penso que é amosa ben como acoplarnos con outros realmente define quen somos.
This my son Jonathan at a very early age. See how he developed a vocal game together with my wife, only from the desire and pure joy of being coupled to another human being.
Este é o meu fillo Jonathan cando era moi noviño. Miren como desenvolve un xogo vocal coa miña muller, só por xogo e polo puro desexo de estar acoplado con outro ser humano.
(Both vocalizing)
(Os dous vocalizando)
(Laughter)
(Risas)
Now, think how the ability of my son to be coupled to us and other people in his life is going to shape the man he is going to become. And think how you change on a daily basis from the interaction and coupling to other people in your life.
Agora, pensen como a capacidade do meu fillo de acoplarse con nós e con outra xente na súa vida vai dar forma ao home que chegará a ser no futuro. E pensen en como vostedes cambian diariamente mediante a interacción e o acoplamento con outras persoas na súa vida.
So keep being coupled to other people. Keep spreading your ideas, because the sum of all of us together, coupled, is greater than our parts.
Sigan a acoplarse con outras persoas, a espallar as súas ideas, porque a suma de todos nós xuntos, acoplados, é maior que as nosas partes.
Thank you.
Grazas.
(Applause)
(Aplausos)