the deal is if you go to politics, you have a lofty vision. the health care deal that was very unpopular it did not look great obama looked like a more of a politician. that is why the partnership was so interesting not delving into the secrets of their marriage but herb bashan of the presidency and what she stakes him to and the standards and if he can meet them. >> we are back live from

the tucson festival of books. you can watch the events online live on c-span2 booktv.org. we bring you up panel on the brain. >> i am moderator this afternoon. my background is i am a neurosurgeon and your scientist here and we are blessed this afternoon to have three books about the human brain that have widely divergent views how the brain works and how we relate to the inner workings hong. we're stuck with the brain designed with hundred thousand years ago but plunged into a world of social networks, a world of overwhelming information coming it is challenged, and

the ability to function at of maximum peak in efficiency is in question now. we are fortunate to have three delightful authors who have each taken a look how we change and use our brains. a writer who has contributed to "national geographic" geographic", less than a year times and other premier publications. and is a voyage complexities of the human memory. he takes us on a trip to the memory championship and looks from antiquity about

how memory works. how we can enhance that at champion levels. the next book by joe palca called "annoying" the science of what bugs us" believe it not a scientific inquiry into the very nature of those things that the drive us absolutely crazy. like nails on the blackboard. the scent of a skunk. irritating co-workers. [laughter] cellphones. please turn your soft. and finally, even things in our spouse. he is a science correspondent from npr and on talk of the nation, and

the multi a media editor as well. please welcome joe palca we also have at dr. paul nussbaum specializing in brain health and aging. his book "save your brain" the 5 things you must do to keep your mind young and sharp" his book contains a proactive prescription for a healthy brain and a mentally fit lifestyle surrounding physical activity, and mental stimulation, spirituality, n utrition. it is a manual flow of health the brain tips. please tell me will come dr. dr. paul nussbaum. [applause] our like to ask each author

to spend a few minutes to share their insight and their perspective that i will ask general and specific questions. then opened your questions. >> i can tell you where my story begins at this fannie contest united states memory contest. i witnessed these people memorizing poems, random numbers, names of strangers strangers, it seemed unbelievable. what they're redoing was not the result of the innate talent but training using

ancient techniques invented 2500 years ago increase. the same techniques cicero used to member raised speeches and books. i was fascinating fascinated. then i spend one year trying to train my memory of their race to remember better buy it understand how it works. that is a story i tell and "moonwalking with einstein". >> wish it was more positive knowing how to turn your brain off but the conclusion is you cannot avoid it.

[laughter] it is part of the human condition. writing the book has it made me less an unalloyed? and not really. the book started off with a simple question why a when she was riding on the subway somebody next to her was clipping his nails. she found herself becoming physically irritated with blood pressure. per face was red. no one has ever shown up in the emergency room being hit by a flying finger now. [laughter] so why does something so trivial turn out to be so

annoying and have a physical effected? we tried to explore that. and has to be mediated by the brain. the brain does that to us. >> sometimes we like to have it shut off. we came across some interesting things but the problem is unknowing is not a standard emotion. we ask people what type of studies there are no end was the answer. some psychologists told me there is no such thing as a annoying. that is a lot. i found that annoying. [laughter] they call it a mild anger.

[laughter] i think it is something else. perhaps we would get to those. >> thanks for letting me be a part of the panel. i am from pittsburgh. i spend a good deal of my life on this campus. it is like coming home. i spent some time in the hospital where allen works but a few doors down as a wonderful wrote mentor to me, doing what they're narrows the colleges is supposed to do. you take care of people with brain disease. even i got into the business as a health care provider. there is a problem.

i continue to take care of people with dementia and anomalies of the human brain. i am fascinated by human behavior. but i set out on a separate journeyed 15 years ago to navigate to what is house? i became a pariah in my own field. looking at the sophistication of the human brain. my journey is one every homosapien learn about the basics of this wonderful miracle that sits between your ears. this for pound miracle 25%

of the blood from every heartbeat. we do not have a care today even for err prevention but that should not stop us from the cave being in ways that promote health. i have tried to look at the research in my book with "save your brain" and look at the five sectors. physical activity common mental stimulation stimulation, spirituality, s ocialization and, what is important that we should be busy thinking about across our lives ban? it is nice to back. >> i'd like to start by asking a couple of questions. would you relate to what i

thought was a memorable story you tell about the greek poet and this was a stirring piece of history of memory. >> yes. the story is as handed down by cicero is there is a poet who was attending a banquet sixth century bc. hired entertainment. back then you hired a poet for the entertainment. [laughter] he recites the pallone from memory and walks out then the roof collapses and kills everybody inside. actually main goals the bodies beyond all recognition that nobody can say who was inside and then can be buried.

the sole survivor closes his eyes and has a realization that he can see weary each of the guests have been sitting. he guides each% by the hand to where they were sitting. what he figured out is what we know intuitively, as bad as we are about remembering people's names, numbers, and instructions comment we have exceptional visual and spatial memories. if you can trick your brain to remember stuff that might otherwise be hard it is a huge event age. that technique is what cicero was using that has an incredible 25 year history

that connects the memory contest that i covered. >> as i was reading through the book, i was amazed at some of the tasks, this is the olympics of memory. could you give them a flavor how truly difficulties seem on the surface? >> they are shockingly difficult. superhuman. among the defense people memorize in tire palms, one event you have to memorize hundred of random numbers and minutes, how fast of decks of the shuffle playing cards. no mistakes.

five preachers get up on stage and come up with as much biographical information they can come up with. my phone number, the car i drive, am i address, these people remember all of it. i said inouye. it is something we could all learn to do we will come back to that end techniques that are covered in the book. i like to turn to joe palca. talking about dementia further down but everybody is interested what is a memory loss for system and chap. but say a few words what is it exactly about cellphones that drive us blizzard?

[laughter] >> this is one of the few areas we uncovered somebody tried to do systematic studies progressed to do with the property of the brain that is involved with the memory. when we listen to somebody talking, we're not just sponges pouring into our by become a weird doing something much more active. anticipating what the world about -- what the word will be prep you can trick people by throwing in the are wrong word. [laughter] that listening quality is part of what is happening with a self some conversation.

you can hear what is happening and listening the attention is called to that. then the conversation stops and you fall off the cliff. there is a sense of frustration in. and somebody speaks in a foreign languages not nearly as common. there is another part of it. if you were taught not to raise your voice and a

restaurant, that is a violation of good manners. even if they interfere with what is the right way to behave. somebody told me yesterday in brazil he would be lunch with exchange students from china. they would smack their lips and he had to stop eating with them because what is normal for them. [laughter] >> do you have any advice or guidelines what is acceptable or not annoying cellphone behavior? >> turn it off.

[laughter] go away. there is not one way. larry david has a hilarious sketch. talking on the phone really loud. slow the guy talks to the imaginary%. he was eating day psocids. he said talking to myself. it sounds the same to me. there is not much you can do. get up and leave. deranged or having a conversation?

something disconcerting at the airport. then they are out of complete context to have the animated conversation in. like they have these psychotic fits. >> the issue of memory i am assuming there are concerns about the inability to remember names, details, some of us may be getting it slightly older. what is natural to forget? do you look at the opening

itself low of dementia? norah what was i saying? [laughter] seriously. what is a normal lapse of memory? >> it is the impact of the environment on the brain. it is not a new concept. what is going on in is the brain highly dynamic. we want to make sure we shape our brains across the life span. if i had a dime everytime somebody says they one dell amo healthy life, of one of

the lessons those tips from us have to be started early in life. a study cannot recently not necessarily a good news but after you are shocked, take a deep breath. memory decline starts earlier than what we had thought. in grad school we thought to frank cod did tiff behavior's. but now it may start in the 40's. take a deep breath. the brain can be shaped to the negative outcomes. there are things we know like chronic stress causes a

physiological reaction where it hits precisely the hippocampus. when i teach the brain understand most audience is not in the health care field. speaking to teachers and librarians. the last i a check they have a brain. the hippocampus is the most important structure it in your body. it is not the heart. the cardiologists would get mad at me but most homosapien swapped around we do goofy things then tell people we love each other with all of our heart. you broke my heart. that is insanity. your heart is the pomp.

but in midlife, this happens more and more a 50 year-old will say i am having memory problems. statistically it is not alzheimer's because that tends to manifest much later. we end up having of conversation that this is a person juggling 23 balls at once. we were kind trying to come up with problem-solving techniques to minimize the balls getting it down at 13. so what we say stress has an impact on those baby-boomers. to understand how you live

your life for review position your brain to do what it can really do. we're doing a very good job to become easily distracted. i can wreak havoc on our ability to process information. we will have about 15 million people with alzheimer's by 2050. we have roughly 300 million americans. the vast majority don't have alzheimer's. i am interested in figuring out how do they not get that disease? it is normal to have memory lapses, in the ability to

come up with names. part of that is stress, i doing too much at once, laying in the jaime tech not want -- technological age, and also true some percentage of those who do have difficulty in their fifties could develop dementia later. we have to follow those people over time. >> i would like to ask with losing your memory going to i want to understand the ultimate memory is a photographic memory. what is the lowdown on a photographic memory? are those stifel smarter? >> photographic memory does not exist.

one case and literature of somebody truly with the photographic memory. >> do want to talk about that? >> it was published in 1970. describes this woman who could take pictureso could take pictures with her mind's eye and manipulate them. after this study can mount that there we're adds a few have a photographic memory, and nobody came forward. the best evidence it does not exist, if it did somebody would show up at the memory contests and they would wipe the floor. [laughter] i am sure the competitors stay up worrying about that.

then how to explain the memory contests? these people can remember lots of information. a few years back they wondered if they have brains better different from the rest of us? no. are they smarter than the rest of us? not really. they found the memory champions used their brains differently. looking at what to regions were lighting up, there activating a part of the brain with spatial memory and navigation purpose same part if they drove their car around the neighborhood. why? is there something to learn

from this? with they we're doing is exactly what the greek poet was doing. walking around in their mind looking at the images they were asked to remember. >> while talking to spatial memory, i can you talk about bill london cabdrivers'? >> that study of memory champions was done behind the same study. we have an index some times and article is slated another journal's we should index undecided in the popular press. probably one of the most influential. london cabdrivers' have different brains than the

rest of us. they have this exchanged from all of the try being around london. the street -- streets are incredibly complicated. you have to memorize every street in this city in a huge number of important landmarks. apparently the process of driving all day physically changes the brain to make up part associated with spatial navigation makes it physically and marched. -- enlarged. [laughter] >> i get lost in my own driveway. . .

the >> well, it's funny having one of the interesting things about writing a book i've discovered is to become an expert suddenly things you're not really an expert in. so the actual answer is i'm not sure but having said that, i will now give you the answer. [laughter] i think -- >> politicians don't do that. >> iowa think the answer is this falls into the category of discussed. there's a lot of things on the

same plane of the lip smacking. there is a quality of discussed that comes into play and that our bodies are invaded in any way in the sense we don't choose to have them invaded, and so i think that's where it comes from because in truth as you know if there is no disease transmission from these. they just seem to be an annoyance but sufficient an alliance to get people to spend a lot of money to try to avoid them, and there may be other reasons to not want them around but that is the sort of interesting one of the things i find interesting about the annoying factor is they are harmful and that is one of the things i enjoyed talking about a mowing as a topic because it is not going to kill you.

once you get to the point you were so annoyed by something that you want to hit somebody, you've moved out of an annoyance and into anger. what i like about annoyance is it is a widely experienced the motion -- in fact i think there is a cut for majeure to a shared annoyance where you bond with people being annoyed talking on the cell phone or with of the new yorker who was rude to you or the clerk at the hotel who didn't believe you that they thought you had bedbugs but of course you can't tell because you don't know you've got the light for ten days. >> i'm only going to be their overnight. [laughter] we thought they were coming from arizona. [laughter] i haven't been there for a year. i was wondering talking about hazards being in education and

academia obviously one of the major threats is fingernails across a blackboard and i was wondering if you could say what's triggering that. >> the thing about that, looking in the audience now when terrified the building is going to collapse. estimate is there a poet in the house. [laughter] >> so the nice thing about fingernails on a blackboard as it seems to be disappearing because blackboards are going away. [laughter] so that is one social annoyance or physical annoyance that's disappearing. again and not well understood the person that did the most systematic study actually one of bell prize which people know about. but it's an open question about why exactly there have been people that have suggested that its the same acoustic signature as a scream so there may be some

quality to it, it elicits a very primal response that we are not aware of why it's so powerful accept it is echoing something that is bad, and we don't know why but it has that affect on us. but that's like a lot of evolutionary explanation is a bit of handweaving because you don't really know if that is the answer it is just an interesting hypothesis. what it doesn't seem to be and there was an article that got some attention earlier this year about particular frequencies at least the people we talked to it's not a specific frequency. if you think it is just the high squeegee scratching part, no. the people we talked to think it has to do with equality of roughness and it is the property of the sound that changes in amplitude rapidly over time and

i suppose if you think about that what's happening is your nails are scratching and then stopping and then scratching and then stopping has the good on the blackboard so you have this quality and so roughness could be involved. it turns off some languages are rougher than others for example french is not a rough language and english is. >> i'd like to ask paul if you would for just a moment since we've been talking about baby boomers and memory come in your book is full of useful tips and guidelines, or some of the things he could share with the audience that we can do to sort of i don't know that we can improve our memory but maybe maintain it in tiptop shape and not have to necessarily go down too fast on the decline after 40. >> i think that it's more thinking about it as a specific

memory is the position of your brain to be in as healthy in position as it can be and so you are hearing just tremendous stories about environment and certain things that happen and get us into a state of the millions some things get us into a state of being able to remember brilliantly. so it's really important to think about what you are exposing your brain to each and every day so in my book the research i've looked at has an example. your brain demands about 20% of the blood from each heartbeat. now to understand how dramatic that is your brain wheys on average 3 pounds but 25% of the nutrition in the blood so your brain is very narcissistic, okay? when i talk to business people they call that market share. [laughter] let's be clear where the blood

is going. so what we've learned is that physical activity is very important. this is not rocket science but it's coming back to the basics. so movement is important, walking about, university of pittsburgh tells walking on my offer six days there was a study that said it's great that you're walking by you better be walking briskly because if you are walking slowly that doesn't do anything to help promote brain health as i call it. in the scientific research but they will tell you is if you do be if you're a you reduce your the mention so that is the same thing i'm saying all the late turnaround will begin by saying if you do that you are promoting the health of your brain. interest on the data has been found to reduce the risk of dementia as the new england journal of medicine study. so you apply that which i'm really interested in getting out of the ivory tower and say how

we apply that? interestingly look at us today. your brain is and positioned to be very creative. to be creative right now you might move from sort of one side of the chair to the oversight. you might take your glasses off and put them down. that's creativity. think about classrooms across the country. kids are not moving and movement has been shown to increase test scores in the classroom and reduce the risk of dementia leader in life so it seems to have a life span issue. when i look on the campus today i felt a great environment, you know people in speaking and telling stories, there's entertainment and we are moving. quickly nutrition plays the important? we have changed our genetic makeup and structure of our body if you just kind of look around and understand what obesity is going through the roof and so is diabetes and a young age and this goes to the fact of kind of what we are eating.

the brain is compressed 60% bad and the fattest part of view, some people have fun with that this we have to think about what they are. we are good about eating the bad fat, trans fat and processed foods but we are not so good that eating the good facts which tend to find in the omega fattah e3 acids found in fish. the government says we steve about 8 ounces of fish per week and sometimes that can be difficult to change for some people in terms of they don't like fish and so people will last about supplements and you've got to be careful and a big one in terms of trying to get your nutrients through food and work with your doctor if you are going after supplements. another major food category you want to think about are called antioxidants. you folks are smart in here so forgive me but an antioxidant you can think of as a broom that sweeps up the dust out of your

garage every spring. we call those free radicals. we don't know what causes free radicals but everyone seems to contribute to all sorts of diseases that we suffer. so and i oxidants found in fruits and vegetables can help kind of combat those free radicals. i am a big one for spirituality both in terms of formalized religious practices as well as long formal practices there is a movement now called meditation, finding its way into some of the more traditional medical practices in the western civilization. - you may have heard about. relaxation procedures. a prayer to enhance the system and what's going on there for me broadly speaking as a selling of the brain, a lining of the motion with the analytic part of the brain and finding peace. there's an interesting work done in the field of neurophysiology if you are interested. mental stimulation, you want to expose your brain to things that are not more complex.

those are really important words, novelty and complexity. you don't want to be a passive animal because brain health is stemmed and goes to what josh was talking about in the taxi drivers we we some interesting studies where travel reduces the risk of dementia and why is that? when you go home if you are from choose on today you are not going to use the part of your brain that is going to brief bring health because will be a subconscious the year. it's a scary estate but if you are in a familiar environment it is. if you come to pittsburgh or we go to london like joshua teaching us you're going to utilize the cortex and it's a much more health promoting environment because it's an awful complex. finally a tip of the socialization and this goes back to what joe was talking about in evolution to read our brains and grew as a result of us being group oriented, nurturing, communicating, hunting with each other, defending each other, loving each other, and that

doesn't stop across the life span. older adults are at risk of dementia if they isolate and segregate. this can show up by data from his 84 and isn't coming out of his room anymore. that is a brain a setup for dementia so we want to get them out. it's a very important health promoting thing for the brain because you want to get them into the novel and complex environments so those are some tips within each of the slices. >> we will finish with one last question for the panelists and then open up to questions but before i do i think as a service to all of you, i need to read from joe's book. i think everyone of you needs to write this down. this is a device i didn't know existed. it's called the anoyatron that generates a short beep at random intervals every few minutes. it's very difficult to find out because of its small size with

emily's is coming from, it's unpleasant, it's unpredictable, you are falsely led to believe it might have ended at any moment to read it comes with a 2 kilohertz sound that is annoying enough that if you want to aggravate you can bump yourself up to the 12 kilohertz sound, and then for those that want to go all out there is a new model called the of eviltron which is the same thing that has bigger speakers and scratching noises, gasping breaths, sinister child laughing in the whispering hey, can you hear me? [laughter] so, what i would like to finish up with is and seems to me we live in the world now 247 information of being hooked up to every imaginable data source,

so i'm going to ask each of you after your insights into the particular brain function that you got interested in and specialized in is there some piece of but fice, are we doomed to be overwhelmed or is there a piece of the advice you could share with the audience that could give us a strategy of how we are going to negotiate our way through 21st century that seems hellbent on completely overwhelming the central nervous system? >> i think we're going to have to figure out ways to carve out states and technology and the 24/7 connectivity. i predict that as much as religion may be on its way out that we are going to see it making a comeback as a way of

removing ourselves from technology in a kind of forced labor. maybe the ramesh lifestyle, i don't know. truly i don't know. i think this is a big challenge for my generation and every generation after me how we are going to figure out how to remain human at the same time as we are increasingly becoming effectively cyborgs. >> well said. johan? >> i don't have a prescription so much, but i think that one of the most of valuable things you can do is to try to be more attentive to your surroundings and the effect that you're the teachers are having on others. i think that in these rich environments we have sometimes it is easy to get distracted and remember you are doing something that can be annoying. someone said to me which i think it's true if you don't know who

the most annoying person is in the room it's probably you. [laughter] but i do think that a better appreciation of how we fit in any social structure is going to make life a lot easier for all of us. >> paul? >> i have a lot of hope because i think the greatest system ever designed and miss universe or any is within us and that is the human brain. we are good that underestimating the power of the human brain is unbelievable. we don't know much tall about this thing. i use the word he devotee three or four times. it's going to radically shift civilization once we begin to understand how this works, the human brain. the other thing i would say which builds on what josh and joe were saying is nobody's forcing anybody to go get into the the roller-coaster ride of

technology in the fast stream of life. i challenge americans because we tend to be anxious animal, and i challenge americans just give yourself 30 minutes a day for 30 days and i'm willing to bet you a penny you can't do it and so they're in lies the challenge how we get to know ourselves better and begin to prioritize what's really important and then how do we begin to execute the behavior necessary to settle. >> one final statement. i'm 49. i had a very traumatic thing which assignment from the t-mobile, two fer rise in which meant i had to switch e-mail and everything. i told you about chronic stress. true story, as i'm sitting there in the shop in a box literally a four or 5-year-old who just goes up and starts touching everything and is doing all

these things and i said i'm a ph.d. with a million publication, can you please show me how to do this? [laughter] so the younger ones are going to be just fine. i'm the one that needs the help adapting to this. [laughter] [applause] so, let's open up to questions from the audience. there are two microphones in the room. if you would kindly step to the microphone so we can all hear the question and we will start over here with you. >> i have a question that dr. nussbaum what to recipient about socialization and getting out. there are a lot of people that do they're socializing sitting down using technology. is that sufficient? >> i don't know, and i don't think we know that answer.

i don't think it will ever replace for lack of a better word the chemistry that's involved in the human to human interaction. that's critical and will always remain critical. it's already started to change and it will continue to change but we have to work to try to keep that human touch is very important looking into each other's eyes, sharing stories and these kinds of things are never going to be less important. thank you. >> this is for julca coming and i have read about people that have memories i don't think it is considered a photographic memory that they have an memory with a can remember everything that happened in their life day-by-day. it is like six or seven of them in the united states. is that a true thing? to these people exist and can they really remember those things? zipf. estimate for d'aspin identified.

i have interviewed a the first woman they found in this condition, and i have to tell you it is utterly impressive. i came with a set of dates that i've gone in and looked up in advance. december 17th, 1987 do you remember what was on murphy brown at night and by god, she did and it's astounding but here is what is really interesting. all these people that have been found with this incredible autobiographical memory of one thing in common which is they all have some degree of effective compulsive disorder and that became apparent to me when i was speaking with this woman. she was obsessive and printed out the weather every day. she badly wanted to remember every day for life and each morning she was will try and her hair should think that, she had done that day at the year before

three years before, she was effectively rehearsing her own life and based on my own experience of, you know, what i went through in terms of learning there was this incredible memory capacity lead in myself and i think all of us wonder what is interesting about these people with this condition is not an incredible memory but rather an incredible compulsion to want to remember. i wonder if it might be the case if any of us were so compelled to try to remember every day of our life to do what she does with effort whether that is the capacity we might have genocide all of us. the question is why don't we bother. that is an interesting philosophical question. why don't we bother to read the only life we live is the life we remember and we are happy to let our days and saturday and these

people are not so maybe they are thus in ones and the european same months. [laughter] >> this is for dr. nussbaum to define a 15 ovarian cancer survivor and very conscious about my dalia and health and exercise. highlight agent, or glass of wine once or twice a week how many brain cells do you kill with a cocktail down the road of long-term care for a long and healthy life how does that come into play? >> i always get the alcohol questions. [laughter] >> first of all congratulations. [applause] i will just give you the research i've looked at and ellen is a medical doctor recommended to chime in here, but what i have read in terms of alcohol, and a lot of studies have been done on line in

particular red wine and that goes back to the antioxidants i was talking about before. you see the same thing in grape juice for those who can't drink alcohol. the caveat here are obviously we don't want folks to drink -- i'm not trying to be funny but we don't want folks to drink alcohol who are predisposed or have suffered from alcoholism. they're also are types of cancer where some of the studies indicate alcohol discounter indicated. i'm not an expert in cancer so that's something you really want to talk to your doctor about but in general rule of thumb i go with plastic those two groups away so in very careful here. in the united states year there seems to be some benefit from a glass of alcohol a day. at most what i've seen are very careful with how we say this

from four to 6 ounces of alcohol a day from what i've read maureen seems to indicate to be the most of promoting dhaka, the others as you were pointing at may be of promoting as well. it's been a i would go along with that. until one glass of wine there does seem to be some health benefit. obviously we don't want to promote excessive alcohol intake but there's the antioxidants in particular seem to be where the benefit is coming from i would like to ask regarding bring health and getting your of the gentry research that.com banner do that compares to eating fish because i know there's some medical researchers who have the dalia and said just flaxseed is

just as good and then you don't get the issues of mercury and then i have a one quick one for joshed. what does it mean about eight brain capacity when you can't remember names or faces but you can remember the context of what they tell you? >> josh and i are going to have our own memory test here. [laughter] i don't think it's fair to say there is no conclusion in terms of the with you freeze that question but the important thing is to consider using the proper rell balancing you can talk with your doctor about this between omega three's which are the good fat if you will dillinger the amiga six which can do damage. when we were cavemen indicates when an we 81 good fat for every bad fat. today we think in general we should be getting at worst for bad debts for every good one and the realities we are eating about 16 to 20 that if that's for every one that fact.

the only contribution from the body it because your body isn't going to produce only get 3i don't think the conclusion is there yet. >> don't need a boat for the flaxseed, i know that. >> george, i'm sorry. >> quick question about why we remember the context of a conversation we had somebody but not their name. the reason is a name is actually totally meaningless to you. ann is untethered from all these other things you have floating on your memory and we remember things in context, things that make sense and have meaning so what is going on in the memory context is people are trying and figure out ways to take information that is meaningless like a name and give it some kind of context, some can't expect it to continue to make it more meaningful, and that is

something that is the essence of what is going on and remembering stuff in everyday life. estimate is there a trick when you are meeting people to try to help yourself remember their name? >> one of the tracks people always talk about, and that's actually basically the truck used in the contest's when people memories the names of hundreds of strangers is to come up with some sort of image that associates the person's name with their face. so you might meet me and say okay, foer, sounds like the number four and take a second to picture in your mind's eye somebody could be spray-painted with shaving cream the number four on my face, something that's really bizarre and unforgivable sob neinstein you see knees you have that extra little association that might just keep my name. >> thank you.

>> this is a question for you also become a jolt. you talk about the visual special component of memory and i wonder if you know or can refer me to any studies about people who use the special languages so they are -- that is what their language is and it is special. is their something about using in language like that that plan affects their memory capacity? >> i have no idea but it wouldn't shock me if it radically changed how they perceive the world and then use to their memory but i don't know anything of that. i'm sorry. skin magazines to me that our technology has gone way beyond our brand's capability, and i work with patients and when i ask them simple questions being able to recall plus and less and

less going to their blackberrys and other things remembering more your optimism about the fight-year-old would be optimistic just for the function in that but i see those mechanical functions in the place of the brain work. so where is the brain going to work when we already having the 5-year-old have the stuff that are being used to work for a brand? >> liz your question for cracks >> it's all about memory, it functions on all levels. >> i don't think there is anything that can overwhelm or defeat the human brain if you will. the brand is going to adjust to these kind of things. their use to be a wheel and then there was an engine and an airplane's and different vince that changed as we evolves and the latest is this technology so there's going to be tension

because there's a change but the brand will adjust and i go back to and i have no science on this plan going to go back to my belief nothing will ever be built that is more complicated than the human brain. the brain will be fined. [laughter] >> the kids are going to be okay. i agree. the plasticity part people have been talking about i don't think people quite figured out how best to challenge the human brain to get the most out of it and that's probably what you're talking about here whether it's food, by yet from stimulation context, what better, i think there is a lot more capacity than we figured out how to tap into. astana i don't think the kids are going to be okay. [laughter] i'm really nervous about where things are headed because i think more and more we are

basically merging ourselves with technology and this is going to be the big story of my lifetime and my children's lifetime and i fear that what is driving this process are sort of this progressive question to make life easier and easier and it's not the same thing as making life better and better and better and i fear we are going to wake up at some point in the not too distant future and just wonder is this really what we were hoping for so i am not such an optimist. estimate i want to say before we wrap up that all of our authors are going to be available to slingbox. we will, that the indian do this and i would like to take one last moment and think the authors. [applause]

>> will have more live coverage of the tucson fistful of books and about half an hour i thought i would talk briefly about why this story intrigued me so much a little bit about the reporting process, and bring it forward to today because that is what intrigued me and opened the floor to questions and i will let me first of all i'm sadly not a whole the cross grab which is somebody thought naturally that i must be an alumni of this school to know when i came across the story was stan grayson, one of the men in the book. it was the same that ted wells was a front-page story in the times representing scooter libya

the time, so glowingly back and he started to talk that his classmates come about full their books and i was intrigued because clarence thomas was one of those classmates and i hadn't read much about the interaction between justice thomas and father brooks said that got me interested. i'm a business journalist, it wasn't a business story that i'm always interested in leadership and mentoring, and it took quite a while to get justice thomas to speak with me i think in part because he didn't necessarily trust the agenda which was i would like in fact to dhaka about 1968, '69, '70 and what amazed me is when i did go in to see him the depth of passion that he had for holy cross, the feelings and emotions he had

about father brooks. i'm not sure who was at his presentation last week when he got his armory degree but that came up again i think when you contrast how he feels about all across the verses what he has said about this experience at yale there's been a profound difference and i think one of the big differences was his classmates and the way that he felt treated at the college and certainly the way he felt treated by father brooks. so i basically set out to do an article and i decided that it was in fact grounds for a book and this being my first book project i went on all sorts of directions that ultimately didn't work one of which was lots of history of the publisher said well, enough of that. in what was the history that took me awhile to pronounced like everybody else that is not from the area and ultimately it

can come to the story of these five men and of their works people like talked to a head to diminish their rule and the look and take names of because again myett pitcher severin getting confused keeping track of all these people, focus on these men, this fraternity the form and use that as a sort of microcosm for the experienced and what was experienced across the country at that time and i think that there were a couple things i tried to be careful not to do. one was tight and the drama too much with the dialogue. but i think the main thing that was important to me was that holy cross was both special and unique but it was a microcosm of what was happening in the country at that time. i'm not american. i actually grew up in scotland.

a breezy a hindi then when you are reporting that the holy cross. i was always intrigued by this program. i was born in the late 60's, and never really fully understood the kind of emotions of the time the book opened right after dr. martin luther king has been killed, also father brooks intrigued me as somebody who was a pioneer who when velt and basically circumvented the admissions process, he was very controversial as you know, those that have read the book and know him even strong-willed man and basically went out in a car and drove to the school and personally interviewed a lot of these men, not of the men who came in through other means such as eddie who can through an athletic scholarship -- can

everybody still hear me? probably better and then sat in a coffee shop one night and decided who was going to get in, the two of them and then presented a bill to the full third president of the time of it was $80,000 which for a college that had a million dollars of endowment at a time he was quite a cost to their but what he was looking for i asked him how do you decide anybody that is a parent in the room knows that intelligence is not something that is necessarily a hallmark of successful or lead to success and when you talk to father books he was looking for leadership qualities, looking for dr., people who had a work ethic, people hoping to reach beyond their grasp, black-and-white and as you may or may not know he was fighting a time to get women into the college.

sadly for the class of 72i think they did not arrive until the fall of that year and that was after father brooks became president and said he managed to shake up the trustees board a little bit and get people on that did finally pass the resolution to let women into the college. so i think that women will get this story, and i will to do questions i think what really struck me is when i look at today what is first of all the network and it's the network of these men that's called a fraternity because this is not about one man, a priest the college professor, leader eight dean or president who went out to save a group of men, these are men that are highly motivated and accomplished been have given an opportunity would not have had two or three years earlier. there were african-american students at the holy cross but tended to be one or two years in some cases one.

as art martin would say they would come in on athletic scholarships and to the catholic school network and that was pretty much it. this was the first major group that came, it was 20 men. clarence thomas transferred after dropping out of the seminary said it was the first time they get a critical numbers on campus and i think what happened is father brooks and the call which never feared an academic standard. all of them had to work as hard, harder in many cases and i think ted wells and clarence thomas tended to close to the library at night according to everybody i talked to. but where he did make concessions was socially, and he understood how difficult it was. he gave them a used van, the college paid for them to get off campus as often as they could, he paid for them to have eight bs you and allow them to live together on the blood quarter

which was controversial. i know we have one of the editors of the crusade at the time and i remember reading a lot of the articles that were basically students were upset about this almost resegregation they called it but he understood was difficult and made concessions and when i talk to the men i think was the idea that the very highest levels of the college dean understood people cared about their success, people had faith in them and understand what father books there was always an open door. he had that philosophy from a 2,000 students who were there and many people here feel close to professor brooks and he was with us last night and look last week for clarence thomas' event but when i talk to him he wants leaders and he felt the college was missing out on being the best institution in this country

by not reaching out and getting leaders from all parts of the society, women, black, white, asian. i know the holy cross has made great strides on diversity and certainly there has been a very strong generation of leaders and women. i annette jay roberts and the first class and many other women who were pioneers. but when i looked today i think one thing that is interesting as there has been great success, great faith in terms of what happened with african-americans. ted wells went on to harvard and some of the classmates of american express, can frazier, a lot of highly accomplished men from that generation but there's also a lot of disappointment and there's a lot of disappointment at what happens with the black middle class in this country, what's happened with education and the erosion of opportunity. frankly i think what also happened in terms of some of the decisions, some of which have

been made by justice thomas in terms of opportunities, affirmative action and such, and the next week for this generation is going to be financial, encouraging entrepreneurship to start other businesses and a spa near the same with -- lighting that's my phone -- generation of leaders that cannot and before i take any questions one thing i want to say is another thanks to the holy cross community because one thing this reporting process has reinforced to me is the strong fraternity and the power that this school has had at one of the highest levels of giving this amazing especially for people. we don't give. we are like the government will do it. the holy cross we look at the networks that have been formed,

the friendships, the power of the cross as they call it and the legal support each other across the generation i think it's a jury inspiring and is also it estimate of how leadership happens in this country and everywhere else and the support and the love people have shown in this process that they've shown for these men and an appreciation for how difficult it was to be pioneers but i hope it is a story we will continue to come back to again as a reporter and given the support i got from holy cross i want every story from now want to be based on the holy cross campus. thank you very much for supporting the book. i don't think it just justice to the period, to these men or father books but i hope it is a start and that others will come forward and continue to tell stories. >> you can watch this and other

programs online at booktv.org. you've written a book about the obama and it's an all add wiring book. the administration has i guess disagreed. they've come out with comments about you. what's it like as a political firefight we are not used to being in the middle of it and what do you make of what is happening? >> welcome it is a little strange because -- i've been covering the obama as for five years and it really started with a series that we do with the paper called the long run and it's about trying to capture the

lives of the candidates and especially because the candidates are restricted now and it's hard to get access to them one of the ways we learn about them is we don't in their past and their characters and we look at the whole person and so this book in a way is an outgrowth of the strings which have been doing for years and years and so goal of this book was to write about what i would call the big change. when i started covering barack and michelle obama they really were we barack iain michelle. watching these to regular people become president and first lady of the united states and i saw it wasn't a process that happened on inauguration day when somebody takes an oath but it's a huge learning curve made all the dramatic in the obama story because of their freshness

to national political life and also because the fact they are the first african-american president and first lady so we see a couple things happening. two people learning to take their partnership which is to be this private thing and turn it into a white house partnership. b.c. michelle obama have a tough landing initially in the white house and then actually turn it around and then the third thing the book is about is the most fascinating thing i find about barack obama which is his struggle with politics. after all these years i can't get a for the fact the top politician in the country is a complicated relationship with the business that he's in. so it worked on the book for two years and i published it. the white house calotte treated. i've been working with these folks for years to get lots of folks in the obama circle gave the interviews. they knew exactly what they were getting into. i never misrepresent what i was

doing and also i fact checked the book with an assistant before publication and we published an excerpt in the times on saturday and then to interesting things happened. at the first thing is that people started discussing the book without having read the book and that's never really happened to me before because as a newspaper reporter everybody reads your work in the newspaper, and the other thing is that the white house did start pushing back in interesting ways. if they hadn't really challenge to the reporting in the booklet i haven't gotten a phone call from david axelrod saying you've got it all wrong and the quotes are in the book, but it's something that surprised me which is that michelle obama went on tv and i'm paraphrasing, she said i'm relieved haulier of depictions of myself as an angry black woman and she also

protested portrayal of her fighting directly with rahm emanuel, so that was kind of fascinating to me because the book definitely does not portray her in any stereotypical way and i'm very clear to mention of the clashes between her and rahm emanuel maybe i shouldn't undercut my own reporting and talk about their differences in the approach to political life that's what they were. she did acknowledge she didn't read the book so we have to imagine that she is responding maybe to the coverage of the book instead of the book itself. part of the reason i'm excited to be here tonight is to talk about the actual thing with you and with all of you. >> let's go to that political scene because that is one of the themes in the book. when theodore roosevelt went to politics everyone around him said you don't want to do politics that is beneath people like us. what is it about the politics?

>> part of the reason i think the qualms are important and not to be dismissed is there similar to the qualms a lot of us have about politics. we all see what is wrong with the political system, whether it can address the social needs and what not but this was one of the things that was such a big asset in the campaign that ends up being inhibiting in the presidency we see time and time again in my reporting sometimes in simple ways and sometimes complicated ways i felt he had trouble acting like a politician and a small story in the book is about the party in the white house, and you know, he is claimed to differ pretty well -- key is kind to everybody but he doesn't want to be the dhaka spending of the super bowl

schmoozing and he has this idea that he wants to still hang on to a normal life and the presidency, and so in my reporting high watched that idea get tested again and again and again. >> there is another story in the book he insists on having dinner every night at 6:40 and that is a sort of the admirable side of not wanting to catch them. is that a constant theme to preserve the domestic life as opposed to full time? >> certainly wanted to preserve the domestic life part of the trauma of the situation is that barack obama gets to washington and not only so much managerial or executive are national security or economic experience off pfft but he's never lived in the same house as his family full-time and the house they're going to live in for the first time as the white house which is not in any way shape or form

like a normal life. but i think the 6:30 rule and he's willing to mr. north his family for important situations i find in my reporting that the far constantly seeking ways to kind of limit and protect themselves from political life. >> why do you think he ran if he is ambivalent about politics? >> i think it was a rash decision and a hard decision. his aides say that in the summer of 2006 he was still dismissive and they began to test the waters but when you think about it the decision making process went from the summer of 2006 through the fall and what people kept telling him as your time is now. if you miss this window of opportunity may never get it

again and part of the drama in the situation is how obama is initially imposed because of the family issues and she's worried about the talks and she thinks a couple years may benefit him and what modulator chief of staff said to me is the decision really weighed on her and i find her situation at that time so dramatic because the way people describe it is she did feel her husband would be an exceptional president yet she wasn't sure that was the best thing for her family so how do you choose between what you think might be good for the country and what might be good for you? was denied the wife of a veto power to you think they had those things under discussion, argument back and forth? >> the president and first lady have talked about it and the physical white house is almost a character in this book.

i spend a lot of time describing what exactly like to live there and with the structure is like and all of the restrictions that come with those lives and i will admit that is fun to report and read and there is a little bit of an exploratory pleasure getting inside the house but there are to substantive things about and this is the mechem argument of the book which is that isolation of the presidency has two important effects on the system. one is it limits the number of people that are willing to run for office along with all the other factors, but people are willing to go through the presidential campaign and then live this incredibly restricted life is pretty small and then the other thing is we consistently see these presidents get cut off in the white house and they all say it's not going to happen to them

and it happens to all of them. >> michelle obama is in one of the youngest -- the youngest person to serve since the revolution. did she because of what generations she's from have a more difficult time being the second of that is the right word? steny it's funny because she is with hillary clinton in that way. in my reporting - again and again that she and kind of everybody else in the white house have one on the hillary clinton's attrition and also the attacks she went through in the 2008 campaign was pretty painful for her and everybody around her to be that new to public life and to watch herself caricatured that way was really, really hard. the twist i think though is that

we would her aides talked about is that the traditional nature which was confining her in the protecting her because political life is so scattered and difficult but it's another way of limiting. it's another way of saying i don't to policy, i don't have to be part of this discussion with. i'm not going to get engaged in these kind of debates. i think there is something very protective about the traditionalism a role and now she's playing a much more in the presidential message of what she wanted in first place. >> there are moments that she displays want and the you describe she's wearing normal short to go to the grand canyon and in the post they made fun of them saying i don't know what

aretas and shorts and a regular shorts and how do you weigh all the balance of the vulnerability and fierce that alternate in the book? >> it's fascinating, she -- part as the reason with spanish murphree is angry black women from the culture part of the reason that character is wrong is it misses the vulnerability and the anxiety and that's the word they use. they don't call her angry they call her anxious. the point in my reporting we're right on her head fuming was scott brown the republican wins ted kennedy's senate seat and this has devastating consequences for the president's

legislative agenda, it's all in jeopardy now, and she has to issues with her husband steam. one is she doesn't understand how they could sort of let this happen and it dropped the ball in the race but the other issue that goes to the heart of the role she plays in the presidency is that she's always had this idea that her husband is going to be a transformative president. she's never liked politics and the deal has been if you are going to go into politics, you have this lofty vision of who you are going to be, and the administration made these health care bills that didn't look that great in the barack obama was starting to look like a more ordinary politician and that is what she was reacting to so that's part of why i think the partnership is so interesting. we are not delving into the

secrets of their marriage, we are looking at her vision of the presidency, and what she's takes him to and the standards she has and whether he can meet them and here is a look at books that are being published this week. inaudible ..