Jack ’ s hippocampus is bigger than yours

My dog Jack, thinking, has a proportionally larger hippocampus than you do. If I had a pet bunny, its hippocampus would be (proportionally) larger, still!! You’ve probably heard a lot about the crucial role that the hippocampus plays in recording our “episodic” (historic, serial, ‘long-term’) memories. Does this mean that we should revise that age old saying to “Molly has a memory like a… rabbit!” Or what?! Or put another way, what can a rabbit or dog DO, that is decisively superior to YOU? It turns out that dogs and especially rabbits have an exquisite ability to reconstruct and remember their spatial environments, on the basis of visual and olfactory cues in their landscape environments. I learned this in part as a young lad hunting rabbits. (Mercifully, I was rarely successful.) A rabbit fleeing from a source of danger has an interesting escape strategy. They run on a very highly unpredictable path of sudden turns and starts. With their powerful hind legs they can stop on a dime and move sideways as no human (except perhaps Barry Sanders, the retired NFL halfback) can. Yet, from their very erratic path, they always know EXACTLY where they are, and EXACTLY where they’re going. I know this because I have repeatedly seen their erratic flight lead them DIRECTLY to a burrow opening, or into a tunnel into the briar patch. Our episodic memories are reconstructions of PLACE and TIME. It is the hippocampus and associated cortica...
Source: On the Brain by Dr. Michael Merzenich, Ph.D. - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Aging and the Brain Autism Origins, Treatments Brain Fitness Brain Trauma, Injury Childhood Learning Cognitive Impairment in Children Cognitive impairments Language Development Reading and Dyslexia Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, et ali Source Type: blogs