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Central premise = fatally flawed plot hole

posted 13 years ago by dalinian
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The central premise of the film ‘Limitless’ (2011) and its source novel ‘The Dark Fields’ (2001) is fatally flawed, since it is predicated on an urban legend. When Vernon introduces Eddie Morra to the NZT48 drug MacGuffin, he perpetuates the old “We only use 10% of our brain” myth (though doubling it to 20%), and Eddie fails to challenge him. Since that myth is false, it’s also false that 30 seconds after taking a ‘miracle pill’ anybody could become hyper-intelligent and memory-perfect.

The old “We only use 10% of our brain” myth has been extensively debunked [1] by, for instance:

• Neuroscientist Barry Beyerstein in "Whence Cometh the Myth that We Only Use 10% of our Brains?", in Prof. Sergio Della Sala's ‘Mind Myths: Exploring Popular Assumptions About the Mind and Brain’, 1999
» http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mind-Myths-Exploring-Popular-Assumptions/dp/04 71983039

• Psychologist Benjamin Radford, Managing Editor of the ‘Skeptical Inquirer’, at Snopes.com, 2007
» http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/10percent.asp

• Professor of Human Cognitive Neuroscience Sergio Della Sala in ‘Tall Tales about the Mind & Brain’, Xmas lecture in Edinburgh, 2008
— 'We only use 10% of our brain' myth debunked from 23:00 to 41:30
» video, 57:07 – http://www.ed.ac.uk/news/all-news/dalyell-prize

• Mythbusters Grant Imahara, Kari Byron, and Tory Belleci, in ‘MythBusters’ Episode 151, 2010
» http://mythbustersresults.com/tablecloth-chaos

Even with the willing suspension of disbelief in primary physiological/psychological truths, the films still fails – because as many authentically intelligent reviewers and board posters have pointed out, the writers just weren’t up to the task of writing a convincing hyper-intelligent memory-perfect protagonist, let alone a likeable one.

The only level on which the film works is as an allegorical and satirical fable on the dreadful state of C21 American society – desperate for the 30 second quick fix solution in pill form, addicted to vulgar materialism and “I'm all right, Jack” narcissistic egoism, obsessed with recreational sex, and mired in dog-eat-dog casino capitalism where businessmen are morally equivalent to drug dealers, all ruled over by the plutocracy of Big Capital. I guess you’re getting dealt the kind of decadent films you deserve.

dalinian

[1] The 'We only use 10% of our brain' myth has been extensively debunked – for instance:

• Studies of brain damage: If 90% of the brain is normally unused, then damage to these areas should not impair performance. Instead, there is almost no area of the brain that can be damaged without loss of abilities. Even slight damage to small areas of the brain can have profound effects.

• Evolution: The brain is enormously costly to the rest of the body, in terms of oxygen and nutrient consumption. It can require up to twenty percent of the body's energy – more than any other organ – despite making up only 2% of the human body by weight. If 90% of it were unnecessary, there would be a large survival advantage to humans with smaller, more efficient brains. If this were true, the process of natural selection would have eliminated the inefficient brains. By the same token, it is also highly unlikely that a brain with so much redundant matter would have evolved in the first place.

• Brain imaging: Technologies such as Positron Emission Tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) allow the activity of the living brain to be monitored. They reveal that even during sleep, all parts of the brain show some level of activity. Only in the case of serious damage does a brain have "silent" areas.

• Localization of function: Rather than acting as a single mass, the brain has distinct regions for different kinds of information processing. Decades of research have gone into mapping functions onto areas of the brain, and no function-less areas have been found.

• Microstructural analysis: In the single-unit recording technique, researchers insert a tiny electrode into the brain to monitor the activity of a single cell. If 90% of cells were unused, then this technique would have revealed that.

• Metabolic studies: Another scientific technique involves studying the take-up of radioactively labelled 2-deoxyglucose molecules by the brain. If 90 percent of the brain were inactive, then those inactive cells would show up as blank areas in a radiograph of the brain. Again, there is no such result.

• Neural disease: Brain cells that are not used have a tendency to degenerate. Hence if 90% of the brain were inactive, autopsy of adult brains would reveal large-scale degeneration.

~ Neuroscientist Barry Beyerstein, quoted in ‘10% of brain myth’, Wikipedia
» http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10%25_of_brain_myth

[–] tim_nikolen 13 years ago

Hey man.

The guy(character) that uses the 20% line, what does he know anyway?

I mean, he just says what he believes.. But we all know this drug opens a large hallway to the long term memory, letting you find or put information alot more effectively.

[–] msyndergaard 13 years ago

I'm surprised nobody noticed that the original poster is obviously using NZT and doesn't want the general population to know of its existense.

[–] francik 13 years ago

If you've noticed it and nobody else has, surely you are on NZT and are simply trying to get everyone onto him. We're onto you msyndergaard.

Yes we are.

Then gain, I could be tripping balls.

[–] JrnlofEddieDeezenStudies 13 years ago

Fiction is never flawed for presenting some things that are different than the actual world. In fact, it's not possible for something to BE fiction if some things in the work are not different than the actual world.

Differences from the actual world are certainly not plot holes.

http://www.rateyourmusic.com/~JrnlofEddieDeezenStudies

[–] sonszak 13 years ago

Well dude since you know everything about the human brain and feel the need to have to flaunt your knowledge, what is your theory on the human brain. Please enlighten us.

[–] blaqueknight2000 13 years ago

This movie didn't have any "fatally flawed plot holes", just different choices of directions that some people disapprove of.

[–] junk-951 13 years ago

To the OP:

The character that made the statement "we only use 10% of our brain" was just the businessman/dealer, not the pharmacologist/etc who created it. It is silly to get so caught up in his off the cuff explanation. The reality is, as with most drugs that cross the blood-brain barrier, modern science has little understanding of their full action on the inner workings of the brain. Even if the character had a strong understanding of the workings of the drugs, maybe he dumbed it down so that Eddie could understand it - since Eddie is simply an ex-junkie turned writer and not someone that is up to date with publications on the brain.

More broadly, I don't believe the premise of the film is flawed. While the effects of the drug are exaggerated beyond what is (probably) possible, there is a possibility for vast cognitive improvements in processing speeds, awareness and memory if a drug was developed that stemmed neuronal apoptosis, increased myelination, and slowed the weakening of underused synapses.

[–] iambecomeaname 13 years ago

awesome, im glad people saw this movie for what it was: totally shallow. i cant believe the people who made this movie thought that the ultimate accomplishment in life for someone who would be capable to doing anything would be to become the rich *beep* president of friggin america. even what it says about girls is horrible coz the main characters love interest ditches him when he`s struggling only to fall into his arms once he`s a big deal to everybody else. freakin shallow.

i get this 10% thing is disagreeable, but to me i think it means that our consciousness is yet untapped to its full potential. we use all the parts of our brain and use lots of energy to keep it in top performance, but when they say 10% i believe it means that we are only consciously aware of a small fraction of the information that we are bombarded with in every moment. using 100% would mean untold powers of awareness, and thats the movie we could make dealing with notions about evolution and the true nature of the mind like 2001 space odyssey. thats the movie id like to see, but this piece of *beep* did so much more than disappoint.

to me this felt like if they made a movie about superman but the only thing he does in the movie is become a heavy weight boxer and make a ton of money. oh yeah and louis would hate him when he would just be dorky clark kent but then marries the *beep* out of him once hes a famous boxer.

[–] neonberry 13 years ago

Dumb ass. Whether it is a myth or not, they meant we only use 20% of our brain AT ANY ONE POINT IN TIME. NOT that 80% of our brain is totally useless to us.

For example imagine 100 LED lights blinking on and off but only 20 of them can be on at a time. You could further imagine the brightness of the lights as a percentage of that one light meaning you could partially be doing a few things at once but not at the action/activity's full capacity. Like two half lit lights equals one percent. So NZT basically meant MORE lights and BRIGTHER lights.

This makes perfect sense to me. I mean while typing this I'm not going to be efficiently listening and remembering what's on the TV right now.

All your points are make no sense.

And in one of the links you posted it said one person tested at 30% while telling a story and 15% while at rest.. the average at which is 22.5%.

[–] jljones5-166-849097 13 years ago

Congratulations, Troll. You got a ton of replies. Lol. Preying on feeble-minds who aren't used to these tricks. Tsk tsk.