读者文摘:顿悟时刻(6)

The subjects were also wired to machines that captured their brains' electrical activity.

受试者还被连接到能够捕捉他们脑电活动的机器上。

"A second and a half or two seconds before the conscious insight, we see this burst of activity over the back of the brain," Beeman says.

比曼说：“在我们意识产生的前一秒半或两秒钟，我们看到大脑后部突然爆发的活动。”

The brain, he thinks, "is blocking visual input¹, which helps allow weaker information to compete for attention."

他认为，大脑“正在阻止视觉输入，这有助于较弱的信息争夺关注。”

When a thought entered the subjects' consciousness—aha!— the neocortex, the part of the brain associated with sight and hearing,

当受试者意识里产生一个想法——啊哈!——大脑中与视觉和听觉有关的新大脑皮层

lit up like a Christmas tree. The conscious brain takes credit, one could say, for the heavy lifting done behind the scenes.

像圣诞树一样被点亮。可以说，有意识的大脑归功于幕后繁重的任务。

The brain in "idle," it turns out, can be far more active than the brain focused on completing a task.

事实证明，“空闲”状态下的大脑比专注于完成任务的大脑要活跃得多。

This was the 2001 discovery of Washington University neuroscientist Marcus Raichle, MD, who, in observing the resting brain, saw that there was essentially² a party going on in the dark.

这是2001年华盛顿大学神经学家Marcus Raichle发现的，他是医学博士，通过观察静止的大脑，他发现大脑实质上有一个秘密集会。

The default mode network, as Dr. Raichle came to call it, is crackling with activity, burning perhaps 20 times the metabolic³ resources of the conscious brain.

瑞秋博士后来称之为“默认模式网络”，它的活动异常活跃，燃烧的代谢资源可能是清醒大脑的20倍。

So the brain's resting-state circuitry—which is turned on, paradoxically, when you stop focusing on a problem and just veg out—

所以大脑的静息状态环路——矛盾的是，当你不再专注于问题而放松下来的时候，它就会启动——

is very likely the best place to park a problem, for it employs the best, wisest, and most creative (though not necessarily fastest-working) mechanics

很可能是问题解决的最佳场地，因为它采用了最优良、最智慧、最有创造力（尽管不一定是最快的）的机制。

1 input   

n.输入(物)；投入；vt.把(数据等)输入计算机

参考例句：

• I will forever be grateful for his considerable input.我将永远感激他的大量投入。
• All this information had to be input onto the computer.所有这些信息都必须输入计算机。

2 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

3 metabolic   

adj.新陈代谢的

参考例句：

• Impressive metabolic alternations have been undergone during embryogenesis.在胚胎发生期间经历了深刻的代谢变化。
• A number of intoxicants are associated with metabolic acidosis.许多毒性物质可引起代谢性酸中毒。