What would happen if we found a way to use 100% of our brain potential?
116941
We might be able to be in two places at once. Either that or our faces would explode.
834843
Brain implants so that you can learn without any effort, like on The Matrix.\n\nOr Yahoo! Answers.
237084
Leave aside frontal and parietal; they can deactivate entire brain.
359447
When you think about it. . . that's a good question.  I agree, you would probably have to have the brains of a computer to learn it all in one day.  To tell you the truth, you could learn maybe half of it in one day but you would never remember it all.  I guess what I'm trying to say is, in the real world, it's next to impossible.
1122167
That 10% story has fallen to Urban Myth status.  New medical imaging techniques can now show which parts of the brain are in use during particular functions, such as speaking, reading, listening to music, etc.  Turns out that your brain uses many differnt parts to do most functions, but certiain functions TEND to concentrate in particular areas.\n\nWhat remains of the myth, though, may actually help understand what I said in the last paragraph.  Many people who have hade severe brain damage and loss of many functions, can sometimes regain at least some ot those functions when the brain learns to use other, undamaged parts to do what the damaged parts used to.\n\nYeah, a vital organ.  An artificial heart can keep a person going, but with no brain, even a beating heart runs in an empty shell.
604568
Actually, the brain uses electrical AND chemical messages.  I believe this is one of the reasons the brain is able to acheive such complexity of operation.  Computers are not currently capable of that same complexity, and my theory is that the computers are limited by the fact they use ONLY electrical data.  By combining electical and chemical messages, the computing capabilities are expanded exponentially.  No source for this.  It's just my personal hypothesis.
823909
Technically, it would be possible, but likely very delicate.  Experiments are underway to assists people with disabilities, and look promising, but the control is done with very coarse setting like "thinking about talking" and "thinking about moving the foot", so that very distinct area of the brain are involved, so that they are easily distinguished in operation. To go beyond that, and be able to control very delicate instrument with high precision like it was one own limb would probably require going in and tapping the nerves directly; picking up the signal though the thickness of the skull and homing to an area that is measured in millimeter -- let alone singling out one neuron -- is asking too much.
507453
Yes.  The human mind is just an incredibly complex computer which can manufacture it's own connections.  All we need to do is get the software and hardware sides of our current technology up to the level of our brains and beyond...  Easier said than done, I know.
761779
It isn't true that we only use 10% our brains.  That is a very common myth that was started because of misinterpretation of scientific data.  The fact is that only 10% of our brains is made of up actual neurons that transmit signals, while the rest are glial cells that provide structural support and nutrition to the neurons and clear waste products and excess neurotransmitters.   However, these cells are all used most of the time.\nTo answer your actual question though, the brain is sort of designed to forget things for two reasons.  There is so much going on around us that we experience, if we paid attention to and remembered everything we would be overloaded by all this information pretty quickly.  Secondly, new connections need to be made all the time to incorporate new things that we learn, so in the midst of that some other connections are weakened or lost.  Sometimes things we mean to remember are lost in this process.  Of course, our brain doesn't always work how we would like it to, but like you said generally the things that are most important are the things that we remember, which is exactly how it should be.  Why store unnecessary information?
1143349
No, it is an urban myth.\n\nWhile for the people who repeat that myth, it's probably true, the rest of us happily use all of our brains.
1024711
Like all of us, Einstein used 100% of his brain.  There are no areas of the brain that are not alive & active (and therefore, in use.)  It is possible that he did use his brain a little differently from the average person.  But since we really don't have a clear picture of how the average person uses their brain, this is just speculation on my part.
486691
This is the best question I've ever seen.  Thanks so much for asking it!  You will not get the full answer, but it will be very interesting if you keep asking smart people what they think.  I really want to know the answer to this question, and I never thought to ask it myself.\n\nObviously the brain (and possibly the body as well) requires some kind of regenerative process, just like it requires a certain amount of food and water and oxygen.  You can't go too long without either, or else your body will break down.  If you "lose sleep," you suffer - no one gets away with it.  In fact, one of the ways they use to torture prisoners of war nowadays is sleep deprivation.  Even the most hardened killers begin to crack under its effects, physically and psychologically.  \n\nDo trees sleep?  You have to wonder.\n\nI'll let you in on one secret I know that most people do not.  One of the answers to your question is that the unconscious mind has about 1 million times more processing power than the conscious mind.  It would make sense if our body's natural functions require the full force of regulatory calculations that only the unconscious mind can perform.  In other words, if we only used our conscious minds to run our body and brains, we would quickly degenerate and die.  We're nowhere near as smart when awake as we are while asleep.  Unfortunately, the only way to do work (to get food & water) is to be awake, alert, receiving new data, and guiding one's movements.  Then again, we can live for decades in a coma.\n\nThis is such a great question.
1119165
You would turn into energy.
170614
Unless you have suffered brain damage in the past then youare already using 100% of your brain.\n\nThe idea that people only use 10% of their brain is an urban myth. It was popularised up by hippies in the 1960s to support their beliefs in mystical new age energy, telepathy, auras and other psuedocscience.\n\nAll normal humans use 100% of their brain. People who claim otherwise may have suffered brain damage and be using less. It would explain a lot.\n\n\nRyu said "Erm, it is not possible to use 100% of our \n>>>>> brain. For normal person, he will only have used about \n>>>>> 4 % of his brain until the day he died. People who can \n>>>>> operate their brain untill 5 % and above we call them >>>>> genious\n\nErm, putting it politely that is Grade A bullshit. There is no scientific basis to your claims whatsoever. \n\nGeniuses use exactly the same amount of their brain as everyone else: 100%\n\nSee the link blelow if you want to know what actual scientists have to say on the matter.
125753
Lol, "unlimited potential" makes this a really bias question. No use being subtle. Of course I would.
680717
The 10% is indeed a myth. 10% is about what's used when you're just sitting there, not doing anything. 10% is just our brain's idle speed, when your asked to do something complicated, that % goes up significantly and every part of your brain is used for *something* No part is just sitting there doing nothing your whole life.
165588
Just to add to webserfun's excellent answer:\n\n"That tired Ten-Percent claim pops up all the time. In 1998, national magazine ads for U.S. Satellite Broadcasting showed a drawing of a brain. Under it was the caption, "You only use 11 percent of its potential." Well, they're a little closer than the ten-percent figure, but still off by about 89 percent. In July 1998, ABC television ran promotional spots for The Secret Lives of Men, one of their offerings for the fall season's lineup. The spot featured a full-screen blurb that read, "Men only use ten percent of their brains."\n\nOne reason this myth has endured is that it has been adopted by psychics and other paranormal pushers to explain psychic powers.\n1) Brain imaging research techniques such as PET scans (positron emission tomography) and fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) clearly show that the vast majority of the brain does not lie fallow. Indeed, although certain minor functions may use only a small part of the brain at one time, any sufficiently complex set of activities or thought patterns will indeed use many parts of the brain. Just as people don't use all of their muscle groups at one time, they also don't use all of their brain at once. For any given activity, such as eating, watching television, making love, or reading, you may use a few specific parts of your brain. Over the course of a whole day, however, just about all of the brain is used at one time or another."