Is it true...that a brain cell can hold 5 times as much as an encyclopedia?

Question

I think it said a set of encyclopedias. (I just saw that on a "forward" and wondered if it was true.) My brain cells must be "out to lunch"! Do you believe this statement is true? ( the one at the top)(please don't comment on MY brain cells)

Answer 1

Definitely not. Don't believe everything you read in forwards..

Answer 2

The brain is an amazing organ, but I am skeptical as to the exact amount of data a brain 'cell' can hold.

Searching on the net I seen this statement only on blogs.  And most of them religious in nature (Especially in Creationism vs Evolution debates).  It also varies.  From '5 times as much as an encyclopedia' to 100 times or as much as 5 encyclopedias.

It seems to have started around 1960 with Stanford neurophysiologist Karl Pribram  who believes the brain is itself a hologram and apparently his theory also explains how the human brain can store so many memories in so little space.

But it just shows how old this piece of, probably erroneous, information is.  Today we'd rather say the average brain can store 10 Terra bytes or the brain has 80Gigabytes of RAM or that the download (learning) speed is 650 kbps :)

Answer 3

Whoever is saying no does not even think about THEIR OWN daily knowledge.  Speech, math, science, computer skills, visual skills, pop culture, etc.  Not to mention the average person only uses somewhere around 15% of their brain capacity.  The brain can certainly hold that much information however the average person will never learn that much, or retain it.  They have said Einstein used about 40% of this brain or so to put things in context.  So factually speaking it is possible but so is another 9/11.

Answer 4

No.

Answer 5

I'm not so sure about one brain cell holding that much information.  Brain cells work together in a network.  I have no doubt the human brain is capable of storing a *lot* of data, but it's so fluid that it's hard to quantify it.  For example, I can recite a poem I memorized in 4th grade, but I can't remember where I left my keys.  Know what I mean?

Answer 6

No, a brain cell is simply one neuron. The power of the brain comes from the fact that we have about 10 billion neurons, and each neuron has up to 10,000 synapses which are connections to other neurons. This mean you can have up to 100 trillion synapses or neural connections!

This neural network is the basis for all our thought and intelligence, but a single neuron itself can be thought of as just one "on-off" switch. Either it fires, or it doesn't. Basically what a neuron does is sum all the potentials being channeled into it by its dendrite connections (in other words, it's input connections from other neurons). If the sum potential is more that some certain activation threshold, the neuron "fires", transmitting an electrical pulse down its axon and to all its outward bound synaptic connections.

So, I'm sure whatever you copied from had a typographical error. Perhaps there was some confusion and maybe it was talking about the information coded into the DNA of a human cell (any cell, not just a brain cell), which often is described as containing an encyclopedia's amount of information?

Anyhow, below is a great site from National Geographic which describes how the brain works, in as much as we know about it. There's also another link about neurons in general. Finally, there is a link about the brain and information storage capacity, where each neuron is treated as being able to hold 1 bit of information. A bit is a binary piece of information, either on or off, like a light switch as explained above. In terms of words and phrases, a bit isn't even enough to code for one letter of the English alphabet (you'd need at least 5 bits per letter). One bit of information is certainly a far cry from an encyclopedia!

Answer 7

I think yes, it just depends on the person on how he uses his brain, i read from a book that the more you use your brain, the more you nurture and develop it.

Answer 8

I personally reckon it is true....In Wiki I've found a stream of study called Psychoneuroimmunology.....It's about how memory / emotions are stored in every cell in our body...So obviously the brain cell can store this amount of information....