Do we only use 10 percent of our brains? No.

The concept that people only use 10% of their brains has been circulating in well-liked tradition for a lot of a long time. In reality, Encyclopedia Britannica says the speculation is one of Hollywood’s favourite bits of pseudoscience.

For instance, the 2014 movie “Lucy” makes use of the extensively held perception as a major plot device. In the movie, Professor Samuel Norman, who’s performed by Morgan Freeman, says during a lecture: “It is estimated most human beings only use 10% of their mind’s capability. Imagine if we may entry 100%. Interesting issues start to occur.”

VERIFY viewer Lucia requested our crew if this concept is true or false.

Do we use only 10% of our brains?

No, we don’t use only 10% of our brains.

There is no scientific evidence to suggest that people use only 10% of their brains, in keeping with Eric Chudler, a neuroscientist and professor on the University of Washington. Instead, all current proof reveals that individuals truly use 100% of their brains each day.

“We use all of our brain. We don’t use only 20%. We don’t use only 10%. We use 100% of our brain,” Chudler instructed VERIFY. “Experimental and clinical evidence suggests that there’s no part of the brain doing nothing.”

According to Chudler, scientists usually use mind imaging strategies, equivalent to functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and positron emission tomography (PET) scans, to have a look at how the mind is functioning.

“When you look at a brain image, all parts of the brain are doing something — there’s no part of the brain that’s just sitting there inactive. So we can use brain imaging and literally see that the brain is active,” Chudler stated.

The notion that people only use 10% of their brains is one of the “most persistent and widely spread brain myths,” in keeping with the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The Association for Psychological Science and Beth Israel Lahey Health Winchester Hospital additionally name the favored perception a delusion on their web sites.

Chudler says the origin of this delusion will not be fairly identified, nevertheless, there are a pair of theories behind the place it might have originated. Some individuals attribute it to a statement made by Psychologist William James in 1907.

“Psychologist William James wrote in a very influential book that we only use part of our possible mental or physical resources, back in, I believe, the early 1900s. But he never put a percentage on it,” Chudler stated. (*10*)

The Association for Psychological Science additionally notes that James on no account claimed that people only use a small portion of their brains. Instead, they are saying James was observing how decorum, social norms and routine fail to have interaction all of individuals’s assets.

“His statement is actually consistent with what we now know about attention and flow states, but James clearly was not claiming that most people perpetually use only 10% of their brainpower,” the Association for Psychological Science says.

More from VERIFY: No, individuals are not both left-brained or right-brained