Thanks to @General_Effort@lemmy.world for the links!
Here’s a link to Caltech’s press release: https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/thinking-slowly-the-paradoxical-slowness-of-human-behavior
Here’s a link to the actual paper (paywall): https://www.cell.com/neuron/abstract/S0896-6273(24)00808-0
Here’s a link to a preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.10234
“They also explain why we can only think one thought at a time”
I know a lot of people who would disagree with that
Those people are probably lying. Try to count in your head from 1 to 100, and simultaneously count down from 100 to 1.
This is surprisingly hard despite the simplicity of the task. Of course I can’t know how it is for other people, but in my experience it is true that we can only “process” one conscious task at a time. I have tried to train myself to exceed this limitation, but frankly had to give up, I even suspect if you try to hard, you might risk going crazy.
We can however learn things so called “by heart”, in which case we don’t have to focus on them consciously, and do that at the same time as we focus on something else. Even things that can be pretty hard to learn, like driving a bicycle.
Musicians playing polyrhythms count at two or more rates simultaneously. Further, they operate their limbs and fingers accordingly.
True, but I wouldn’t call that conscious counting - you’re not literally counting out multiple simultaneous time signatures in your head, it’s done by feel.
Enough a proof that brains are more complex than a single processor calculating one thing at a time.
Furthermore, what about people who had lobotomy done to them? Weird things happen with two halves of the brain (now separate) “thinking” two different things at the same time!
It’s done by counting first. You can’t feel if you don’t count.
They would be incorrect, as this neuroscientist explains: https://drsarahmckay.com/the-myth-of-multi-tasking/