Neurochemistry

Neurochemical is a portmanteau of two words. Neuro from neurons which are the electrical subunit of the brain and chemical which refers to relatively prolonged effect neurotransmitters in the brain. It important to realise that the neuro part is electrical and thus immediate and the chemical part has a longer duration.

There are a few molecules which float in your brain which do specific things:

• Dopamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter. It plays a key role in the functioning of the limbic system, which is involved in emotional function and control. It also is involved in cognitive processes associated with movement, arousal, executive function, body temperature regulation, and pleasure and reward, and other processes.

which determine the now, as electricity can only move at the speed of light it is restricted to instantaneous arc like responses an example of this is the knee jerk response a closed loop reflex, input results in instantaneous output. However this is not always the best case as there needs to be stimuli then in the absence of a higher cortex some method by which a delayed "intelligent" response is created.

Dopamine_carrot_stick_donkey

The method the brain conceived of was to give consciousness, which is that it is immeidately aware of what is now, i.e. the different inputs for the central process, in real time. The awareness travels from different aspects of its environment until it finds ann input which can be dealt with by a specific pre-written pathway in the mind, call this a game.

A game in effect is a prewritten neural pathway, which given a specific input results in a less than immediate response ending in dopamine. Dopamine is the chemical which makes the flow of the pathway of neural activity. Dopamine is not the reward, it drives the response. For a conscious perspective think of a dog and ball. The dog is running around, its brain is in electrical real time mode looking for something that fits as a stimulus for the triggering of the neural pathway. This trigger maybe food, a ball, a person once the input has been selected or reaches a threshold by which it cannot stop itself the pathway is triggered with dopamine release as its target.

Dopamine release curve

The chemicals listed about work in a complicated symphony to produce human behaviour. In respects to burnzero, the most important is Dopamine...

Neurotransmitters

Dopamine

Dopamine works as a reward chemical. When your dog sees the ball you are about to throw it sets a dopamine dynamic where it craves the neurochemical dopamine but the release of which only occurs in the wanting stage. When the dog actually gets the ball, the having stage dopamine disappears. The wanting is stronger than having, we persue flow based behaviours on a stock based world.

Other neurotransmitters

Whilst dopamine is one of the most important neurotransmitters it is only one in a cocktail of others:

• GABA is an example of an inhibitory neurotransmitter.
• Norepinephrine, also known as noradrenaline, is a monoamine neurotransmitter that is involved in arousal, pain perception, executive function, body temperature regulation, and other processes.
• Epinephrine, also known as adrenaline, is a monoamine neurotransmitter that plays in fight-or-flight response, increases blood flow to muscles, output of the heart, pupil dilation, and glucose.
• Serotonin is a monoamine neurotransmitter that plays a regulatory role in mood, sleep, appetite, body temperature regulation, and other processes.
• Histamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter that is involved in arousal, pain, body temperature regulation, and appetite.

Reference