What would actually happen if a human brain had the processing speed and power of a supercomputer?

Answer 1

Humans have something known as a 'biological threshold'. When developing technology for Air Force planes, they found that they had available technologies that could do far more automatically but that pilots and crew had a limit to how much they were able to respond to or act on. They named this limitation the 'biological threshold'. Even if our brains could operate at the capacity of a super computer, we would not be able to function much better or faster.

What would actually happen is pure speculation. Did the person slowly acquire speed and power; did the accelerated capacity occur all at once; or was it acquired over centuries of evolution. All of these possibilities would lead to different outcomes.

The last group is the easiest to speculate. As super brain power was acquired over time, society would have evolved accordingly. What that society may look like compared to our own, we couldn't say because we don't know where it would take them.

The person who acquired it all at once would have the most difficulty due to the fact that the person would be the alone in a slow, plodding world. Unless this person has the means and ability to channel their expanded capacity to some use. 'Lab rat' springs to mind, not a desirable outcome. The age of the person and how this occurred would have a great deal to with the outcome. You as a teen, and me as a senior would have far a different experience in what we would be able to do. Was it done deliberately as on experimental basis or the result of an accident. If it was done on purpose, the outcome would be determined by those involved, their motives and expectations. There are some real life examples to observe outcomes of people acquiring 'super' abilities by accident. Every now and then, a stroke or head injury victim becomes a savant. It usually involves one specific ability but you will find that they lost a lot in the transaction.

If an individual acquired a supercomputer brain over a course of time, the factors determining the outcome would be based on whether that person was the only one, if this was taking place in a number of people, or if it was happening to everyone. An extremely wide area to speculate. A lifetime of Science Fiction novels could be written one by one. Regardless of what you speculate for these last two descriptions of how this ability is acquired, without the opportunity for the world around these people to evolve as the ability evolved, a person or people would reach a biological limit for the capacity to apply their ability.

One contributor said 'It would melt...', meaning the person's brain. This reminded me of a conversation I had more than fifty years ago. A young lady was describing a man she knew; she said he was a professor and he was so smart that he went crazy. Her words were, 'His brains went to his head', and now he's in the institution. Crudely put, but she may have answered your question those many years ago.