December 18, 2017

"Older brains may forget more because they lose their rhythm at night."

"During deep sleep, older people have less coordination between two brain waves that are important to saving new memories, a team reports in the journal Neuron. It's like a drummer that's perhaps just one beat off the rhythm,' says Matt Walker, one of the paper's authors and a professor of neuroscience and psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. 'The aging brain just doesn't seem to be able to synchronize its brain waves effectively.'"

NPR.

52 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Megan Kelly had the researcher on Today the other day.

They used the brain is like a computer analogy philosopher Daniel Dennet doesn’t like.

Anonymous said...


That's racist and some other stuff that'll come to me right after I hit "Publish".

Otto said...

Alas we have lost more than our rhythm at night. Lament of an octogenarian.

rhhardin said...

50 First Dates (2004)
Before I Go to Sleep (2014)

rhhardin said...

Old people thus forgive more. No grudges.

Anonymous said...


computer analogy philosopher Daniel Dennet[t] doesn’t like.

Sort of -
"The vision of the brain as a computer, which I still [2013] champion, is changing so fast. The brain's a computer, but it's so different from any computer that you're used to."

"Control is the real key, and you begin to realize that control in brains is very different from control in computers. Control in your commercial computer is very much a carefully designed top-down thing.

You really don't have to worry about one part of your laptop going rogue and trying out something on its own that the rest of the system doesn't want to do."

MadisonMan said...

And Congress is filled to the ever-lovin' brim with old old old people.

Explains a bit.

Darrell said...

Sounds like you just need to inject a stronger wave to cause the others to sync up.

john said...

My laptop has never walked outside without it's pants nor started driving down the block and couldn't remember if it was supposed to go to the grocery store or to church.

Darrell said...

Alexa, play sync wave. . .

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Electronic drums are the wave of the future.

AllenS said...

Evidence -- Nancy Pelosi.

john said...

Who could ask for anything more?

Unknown said...

I plan to study jazz drumming when I reach 65. Seeing Roy Haynes perform years ago, when he was 82, convinced me! He’s 92 now and still has the fire. -willie

Big Mike said...

And you still believe anything you hear on NPR, Althouse? Learn skepticism. It's not too late!

Sam L. said...

Man! I don't even have rhythm in the day!

Anonymous said...


"couldn't remember if it was supposed to go to the grocery store or to church"

My dad drove to Safeway and ended up in Mexico (~25 miles away). The fact he'd been a cryptographer at Bletchley Park in WWII made it even funnier.

Tommy Duncan said...

I Got Rhythm

Michael K said...

The brain is more like fuzzy logic than a computer ss we usually think of them

traditionalguy said...

3 ways to restore your Rhythm: Read Althouse posts, watch 1950 era Perry Mason shows, and watch Sara Sanders replying to the Enemymedia. All three have equal efficacy.

LincolnTf said...

Are you guys watching the news from Seattle? Catastrophic train crash, no word on casualty numbers but 70 passengers were on the train and it went off a bridge onto a highway. Terrible.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Thanks for that, anonymous

rhhardin said...

The brain isn't a computer. Matter has no inwards. You remove one surface only to be met with another.

Coleridge's argument, after Schelling. Still applies.

Chapters 5-8 of Biographia Literaria have the argument that still works.

Heartless Aztec said...

True enough. I can't seem to learn any "new" songs but can still play everything off Rubber Soul. And tell you who was with me and everything about our guitars in Dec o f 1965...sigh.

traditionalguy said...

Yesterday it was Planes. Today it is trains, tomorrow it could be automobiles.

The ATL Terminal power outage yesterday was a big deal. Chik-Fil A even served the stranded passengers on Sunday. Meanwhile the APD did not do anything to help passengers for 6 hours. The APD has used the Airport Precinct as its dumping ground for its incompetent officers for 40 years.

The Mayor claimed the repairs could not be done until a investigation for a terrorist sabotage was finished. Hmm?

The Seattle news called the derailment of the "High Speed Train" was only going 18 mph on a brand new section of track. That does not add up.

Inga...Allie Oop said...

Interesting! I can’t wait to see what the Brain Wave Synchronizer will look like.

ALP said...

RE: the Amtrak train crash. I ride that route all the time from Tacoma to Eugene. Today was the inaugural trip for the new Tacoma train station and re-route of the tracks from along the water to along I-5. NOT a very good beginning.

LincolnTf said...

I heard it was going 81 mph, not 18. someone transposed a digit on one of the reports I guess.

David said...

Makes sense to me, based on recent experience.

mezzrow said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
walter said...

Great Scot forgot this isn't a cafe...

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Night Moves

traditionalguy said...

I thought the post about Older Trains losing the rhythm of the rails?

Sorry .

walter said...

Actually, I see you were responding to LincolnTf.

LincolnTf said...

My fault for going off-topic. It was one of those instances of the confluence of tv, radio and internet all going at the same time with the same story. Felt compelled to mention it. Damn you, media overlords!

Bad Lieutenant said...

The Mayor claimed the repairs could not be done until a investigation for a terrorist sabotage was finished. Hmm?

So either he makes money this way, or punishes someone. Unless of course you vouch for the fellow. Then he's OK.

Yancey Ward said...

I wonder if sleep impairment is part of it. Over the last 5 years I have watched my father slip deeper and deeper into dementia- a process that has coincided, and seems correlated with fewer and fewer episodes of sleep that last more than two hours at a time.

jimbino said...

@Madisonman And Congress is filled to the ever-lovin' brim with old old old people.

POTUS, SCOTUS and COTUS are full of old old old people because age discrimination in employment is rampant everywhere else.

Peter said...

Scientific drivel. The reason we wrinklies have "trouble" with short term memories is that the longer term ones are so much more pleasant.

walter said...

I guess that's why Conyers was forgetting to wear pants...

Nonapod said...

In the words of the great sage Ken M: “if our brains get too smart they’ll become self aware and take over our bodys”

eddie willers said...

The ATL Terminal power outage

the Amtrak train crash

And two stadiums that demolition "experts" flubbed. Almost 50 years ago, we put a man on the moon. Today we wouldn't even get close.

IMO, nearly two generations of "diversity" hires, white male bashing and the loss of a meritocracy has led us here. Competency is now second to "social justice".

I took my screen name from the 'everyman' character of Atlas Shrugged which opens up in an America where nothing new or great is being created and all former glories are grinding to a halt.

I wish it was otherwise.

Jupiter said...

Freud thought the brain worked like a steam engine. I'm not sure why it wasn't obvious to him that it is actually more like an electronic digital computer.

Peter said...

@Jupiter

More than a few scientists have noted how there is an historical tendency among scientific sages to analogize the brain to whatever is the most sophisticated technological achievement of the age...a steam engine, a calculating machine and now, of course, a computer. How often do we nod dumbly when some cognitive scientist or evolutionary biologist is reported as saying was are "hardwired" for this or that, without stopping to reflect that neither we nor our brains are wired at all.

traditionalguy said...

Electromagnetic medicine is a Great Leap Forward. The blood circulation ( of which 40% goes to the brain) happens because the electric impulses coordinate a heart muscle's beat in rhythm. That is our sine qua non.

Wince said...

Professor Foot: "It's the brain drain... His brain is draining."

Oso Negro said...

Two new items relating to my troubled sleep. 1) I got a CPAP machine based on the idea that sleep apnea was interrupting my rest. 2) I got a Fitbit that claims to be monitoring my sleep. I can report that I am getting more deep sleep per night (per Fitbit) with the CPAP than without. I have also realized that pain in my shoulders keeps me from maintaining one position for very long, so off to the orthopedist I will go. It is clear to me that sufficient sleep is a big key to happier aging.

walter said...

Oso,
I've heard a bit lately about balloon sinuplasty to to help with structural apnea causes. Also..wight management as well as bedding can be an issue.
Maybe you've fully exhausted those avenues..just hate to see someone go to ortho unnecessarily..since they might be the hammer finding a nail.

urbane legend said...

On the bright side of the memory loss: I can forget Hillary that much quicker.

Oso Negro said...

@Walter - appreciate it, but I swung a mean hammer and swam a badass hundred fly back in the day. I am paying for it now.

Caligula said...

A more plausible theory is that old people tend to have aches and pains that interrupt their sleep and otherwise impair sleep quality, and this shortchanges them on REM sleep, which is vital for forming new long-term memories.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28544929

BJM said...

Anybody else listen to audiobooks at night? I choose old favorites, mainly character dense stories that I can stop and start randomly. At the moment I'm listening to Jeremy Irons narrate "Brideshead Revisited"...he could read the phone book with that voice.

I hit play and fall asleep within minutes...I sleep sounder, deeper and longer but I am seldom aware of dreaming when the book is playing. I read somewhere that is called brain entertainment.

I've also noticed that I have to take care not to listen to audiobooks in the car as my brain is keyed to sleep to narration.