New theory on nerve communication

[rwolf]

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007/06/nerve_communication

Sound instead of electricity.

 

[Bigus Dickus]

OK, so maybe they are not crazy. But I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that they are wrong. Yeah, big stretch that prediction was.

BTW, what the hell is wrong with wired's ads? I get huge flash ads blocking half of the first few paragraphs, with no apparent way to get rid of them. If that is the way wired gets ad money, I'll never click on another link there again.

 

[_xxx_]

Interesting theory.

 

[weaksauce]

If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one there to hear it then there will be no sound, because sound is what sounds, and sound waves are defined by movement. A movement is not a sound. Sound may happen when a certain organ is affected by movement, the movement in it self is not sound.

Therefore this whole thing is wrong, since it is not sound but what you would call sound waves.

:smile:

Anyhow, if it is such, then what about latency?

 

[Davros]

And if a man speaks in a forest and there is no woman to hear him - is he still wrong ?

 

[AlNom]

Men are never wrong in arguments with women. Women are just delusional.

 

[3dilettante]

Neuroscientists studying the brain have used high-frequency EM transmitters to disrupt neural activity.

I don't think those emitters produce any sound, so what mechanism explains why electromagnetic waves affect nerves in the brain?

 

[AlNom]

I don't think those emitters produce any sound, so what mechanism explains why electromagnetic waves affect nerves in the brain?

Charge conduction!

(and I might add, the voltage threshold was exceeded leading to the cascade of ion transfer along the nerve etc release of neurotransmitters and activation of receptors on the post-synapse etc etc...)

 

[3dilettante]

That's what I understand the mechanism to be.

How the sound wave theorists can reconcile that example with their theory is what I am curious about.