WEBVTT

00:00:04.931 --> 00:00:06.760
Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here.

00:00:06.785 --> 00:00:09.258
So I am a surgeon who studies creativity,

00:00:09.282 --> 00:00:12.110
and I have never had a patient tell me,

00:00:12.134 --> 00:00:14.976
"I really want you
to be creative during surgery,"

00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:17.401
and so I guess
there's a little bit of irony to it.

00:00:17.443 --> 00:00:20.743
I will say though that,
after having done surgery a lot,

00:00:20.767 --> 00:00:22.977
it's similar to playing
a musical instrument.

00:00:23.001 --> 00:00:25.831
And for me, this deep
and enduring fascination with sound

00:00:25.855 --> 00:00:27.597
is what led me to both be a surgeon

00:00:27.621 --> 00:00:30.155
and to study the science
of sound, particularly music.

00:00:30.179 --> 00:00:32.228
I'm going to talk
over the next few minutes

00:00:32.252 --> 00:00:33.543
about my career

00:00:33.567 --> 00:00:35.851
in terms of how I'm able to study music

00:00:35.875 --> 00:00:37.909
and try to grapple
with all these questions

00:00:37.933 --> 00:00:40.276
of how the brain is able to be creative.

00:00:41.300 --> 00:00:43.930
I've done most of this work
at Johns Hopkins University,

00:00:43.954 --> 00:00:46.939
and at the National Institute
of Health where I was previously.

00:00:46.963 --> 00:00:50.470
I'll go over some science experiments
and cover three musical experiments.

00:00:50.494 --> 00:00:52.550
I will start off by playing
a video for you.

00:00:52.574 --> 00:00:55.677
This video is of Keith Jarrett,
who's a well-known jazz improviser

00:00:55.701 --> 00:00:58.744
and probably the most
well-known, iconic example

00:00:58.769 --> 00:01:01.761
of someone who takes improvisation
to a higher level.

00:01:01.786 --> 00:01:04.925
And he'll improvise entire concerts
off the top of his head,

00:01:04.949 --> 00:01:07.354
and he'll never play it
exactly the same way again,

00:01:07.378 --> 00:01:09.762
so as a form of intense creativity,

00:01:09.787 --> 00:01:11.405
I think this is a great example.

00:01:11.429 --> 00:01:13.776
And so why don't we go
and click the video.

00:01:13.800 --> 00:01:17.800
(Music)

00:02:16.095 --> 00:02:18.096
(Music ends)

00:02:19.920 --> 00:02:22.259
It's really a remarkable
thing that happens there.

00:02:23.683 --> 00:02:26.110
I've always as a listener, as a fan,

00:02:26.135 --> 00:02:27.852
I listen to that, and I'm astounded.

00:02:27.876 --> 00:02:29.612
I think -- how can this possibly be?

00:02:29.636 --> 00:02:31.927
How can the brain generate
that much information,

00:02:31.951 --> 00:02:33.536
that much music, spontaneously?

00:02:33.560 --> 00:02:36.176
And so I set out
with this concept, scientifically,

00:02:36.200 --> 00:02:40.551
that artistic creativity,
it's magical, but it's not magic,

00:02:40.575 --> 00:02:42.582
meaning that it's a product of the brain.

00:02:42.606 --> 00:02:45.040
There's not too many brain-dead
people creating art.

00:02:45.064 --> 00:02:48.695
With this notion that artistic creativity
is in fact a neurologic product,

00:02:48.719 --> 00:02:51.176
I took this thesis that we could study it

00:02:51.200 --> 00:02:54.314
just like we study any other
complex neurologic process,

00:02:54.338 --> 00:02:56.393
and there are subquestions
that I put there.

00:02:56.417 --> 00:02:59.699
Is it possible to study
creativity scientifically?

00:02:59.727 --> 00:03:01.764
And I think that's a good question.

00:03:01.788 --> 00:03:04.474
And I'll tell you that most
scientific studies of music,

00:03:05.298 --> 00:03:06.816
they're very dense,

00:03:06.840 --> 00:03:08.235
and when you go through them,

00:03:08.259 --> 00:03:10.329
it's very hard to recognize
the music in it.

00:03:10.353 --> 00:03:12.572
In fact, they seem to be
unmusical entirely

00:03:12.596 --> 00:03:14.390
and to miss the point of the music.

00:03:15.214 --> 00:03:16.770
This brings the second question:

00:03:16.794 --> 00:03:18.676
Why should scientists study creativity?

00:03:18.700 --> 00:03:20.779
Maybe we're not the right people to do it.

00:03:20.803 --> 00:03:21.802
(Laughter)

00:03:21.826 --> 00:03:25.278
Well it may be, but I will say that,
from a scientific perspective,

00:03:25.302 --> 00:03:27.320
we talked a lot about innovation today,

00:03:27.344 --> 00:03:28.676
the science of innovation,

00:03:28.700 --> 00:03:31.653
how much we understand
about how the brain is able to innovate

00:03:31.677 --> 00:03:32.921
is in its infancy,

00:03:32.945 --> 00:03:36.412
and truly, we know very little
about how we are able to be creative.

00:03:36.436 --> 00:03:37.960
I think that we're going to see,

00:03:37.984 --> 00:03:39.676
over the next 10, 20, 30 years,

00:03:39.700 --> 00:03:41.871
a real science of creativity
that's burgeoning

00:03:41.895 --> 00:03:43.096
and is going to flourish,

00:03:43.120 --> 00:03:45.552
Because we now have new methods
that can enable us

00:03:45.576 --> 00:03:48.100
to take this process
like complex jazz improvisation,

00:03:48.124 --> 00:03:49.498
and study it rigorously.

00:03:49.522 --> 00:03:50.912
So it gets down to the brain.

00:03:50.913 --> 00:03:52.687
All of us have this remarkable brain,

00:03:52.711 --> 00:03:55.166
which is poorly understood,
to say the least.

00:03:55.190 --> 00:03:59.388
I think that neuroscientists
have more questions than answers,

00:03:59.412 --> 00:04:01.614
and I'm not going
to give you answers today,

00:04:01.638 --> 00:04:02.999
just ask a lot of questions.

00:04:03.023 --> 00:04:04.530
And that's what I do in my lab.

00:04:04.554 --> 00:04:07.868
I ask questions about what is the brain
doing to enable us to do this.

00:04:07.892 --> 00:04:10.669
This is the main method that I use.
This is functional MRI.

00:04:10.693 --> 00:04:13.416
If you've been in an MRI scanner,
it's very much the same,

00:04:13.440 --> 00:04:17.355
but this one is outfitted in a special way
to not just take pictures of your brain,

00:04:17.379 --> 00:04:20.305
but to also take pictures
of active areas of the brain.

00:04:20.329 --> 00:04:22.235
The way that's done is by the following:

00:04:22.259 --> 00:04:24.069
There's something called BOLD imaging,

00:04:24.093 --> 00:04:26.492
which is Blood Oxygen
Level Dependent imaging.

00:04:26.881 --> 00:04:30.665
When you're in an fMRI scanner,
you're in a big magnet

00:04:30.690 --> 00:04:33.911
that's aligning your molecules
in certain areas.

00:04:33.987 --> 00:04:37.706
When an area of the brain is active,
meaning a neural area is active,

00:04:37.730 --> 00:04:39.968
it gets blood flow shunted to that area.

00:04:39.992 --> 00:04:44.342
That blood flow causes an increase
in local blood to that area

00:04:44.366 --> 00:04:47.349
with a deoxyhemoglobin
change in concentration.

00:04:47.373 --> 00:04:49.528
Deoxyhemoglobin can be detected by MRI,

00:04:49.552 --> 00:04:51.402
whereas oxyhemoglobin can't.

00:04:51.426 --> 00:04:53.380
So through this method of inference --

00:04:53.404 --> 00:04:55.946
and we're measuring blood flow,
not neural activity --

00:04:55.970 --> 00:04:58.706
we say that an area of the brain
that's getting more blood

00:04:58.730 --> 00:05:02.272
was active during a particular task,
and that's the crux of how fMRI works.

00:05:02.296 --> 00:05:06.875
And it's been used since the '90s
to study really complex processes.

00:05:07.225 --> 00:05:11.124
I'm going to review a study that I did,
which was jazz in an fMRI scanner.

00:05:11.149 --> 00:05:13.652
It was done with a colleague,
Alan Braun, at the NIH.

00:05:13.676 --> 00:05:16.076
This is a short video
of how we did this project.

00:05:16.800 --> 00:05:19.581
(Video) Charles Limb: This is a plastic
MIDI piano keyboard

00:05:19.605 --> 00:05:21.386
that we use for the jazz experiments.

00:05:21.410 --> 00:05:23.962
And it's a 35-key keyboard

00:05:23.987 --> 00:05:26.447
designed to fit both inside the scanner,

00:05:26.471 --> 00:05:27.807
be magnetically safe,

00:05:27.831 --> 00:05:31.673
have minimal interference
that would contribute to any artifact,

00:05:31.697 --> 00:05:34.617
and have this cushion
so that it can rest on the players' legs

00:05:34.641 --> 00:05:37.596
while they're lying down in the scanner,
playing on their back.

00:05:37.620 --> 00:05:40.649
It works like this --
this doesn't actually produce any sound.

00:05:40.673 --> 00:05:43.116
It sends out what's called
a MIDI signal --

00:05:43.140 --> 00:05:45.189
or a Musical Instrument
Digital Interface --

00:05:45.213 --> 00:05:47.874
through these wires into the box
and then the computer,

00:05:47.898 --> 00:05:50.833
which then trigger
high-quality piano samples like this.

00:05:50.857 --> 00:05:52.863
(Music)

00:05:52.886 --> 00:05:55.086
Now I'm going to demo it for you.

00:05:55.987 --> 00:05:58.190
I'm using two mirrors to see my fingers.

00:05:58.215 --> 00:06:01.969
(Music)

00:06:20.766 --> 00:06:22.033
This is improvized.

00:06:36.732 --> 00:06:38.707
(Music ends)

00:06:38.732 --> 00:06:40.376
OK, so it works.

00:06:40.400 --> 00:06:42.376
And so through this piano keyboard,

00:06:42.400 --> 00:06:45.143
we have the means to take
a musical process and study it.

00:06:45.167 --> 00:06:48.094
So what do you do now that you have
this cool piano keyboard?

00:06:48.118 --> 00:06:50.563
You can't just say,
"It's great we have a keyboard."

00:06:50.587 --> 00:06:52.911
We have to come up
with a scientific experiment.

00:06:52.935 --> 00:06:55.058
The experiment
really rests on the following:

00:06:55.329 --> 00:06:58.973
What happens in the brain during something
that's memorized and over-learned,

00:06:58.997 --> 00:07:01.152
and what happens in the brain
during something

00:07:01.176 --> 00:07:03.450
that is spontaneously
generated, or improvised,

00:07:03.474 --> 00:07:05.288
in a way that's matched motorically

00:07:05.312 --> 00:07:08.157
and in terms of lower-level
sensory motor features?

00:07:08.181 --> 00:07:10.776
I have here what we call the paradigms.

00:07:10.800 --> 00:07:14.296
There's a scale paradigm, which is playing
a scale up and down, memorized,

00:07:14.320 --> 00:07:16.054
then there's improvising on a scale,

00:07:16.078 --> 00:07:18.115
quarter notes, metronome, right hand --

00:07:18.139 --> 00:07:19.710
scientifically very safe,

00:07:19.734 --> 00:07:21.607
but musically really boring.

00:07:22.031 --> 00:07:25.002
Then there's the bottom one,
which is called the jazz paradigm.

00:07:25.026 --> 00:07:27.430
So we brought professional
jazz players to the NIH,

00:07:27.454 --> 00:07:30.407
and we had them memorize
this piece of music on the lower-left,

00:07:30.431 --> 00:07:32.249
which is what you heard me playing --

00:07:32.273 --> 00:07:34.766
and we had them improvise
to the same chord changes.

00:07:34.790 --> 00:07:36.998
And if you can hit
that lower-right sound icon,

00:07:37.022 --> 00:07:39.850
that's an example
of what was recorded in the scanner.

00:07:39.874 --> 00:07:43.604
(Music)

00:08:04.604 --> 00:08:06.605
(Music ends)

00:08:06.629 --> 00:08:09.045
In the end, it's not the most
natural environment,

00:08:09.069 --> 00:08:10.975
but they're able to play real music.

00:08:10.999 --> 00:08:12.970
And I've listened to that solo 200 times,

00:08:12.994 --> 00:08:14.171
and I still like it.

00:08:14.195 --> 00:08:16.582
And the musicians
were comfortable in the end.

00:08:16.606 --> 00:08:18.430
We first measured the number of notes.

00:08:18.454 --> 00:08:21.111
Were they playing more notes
when they were improvising?

00:08:21.135 --> 00:08:22.725
That was not what was going on.

00:08:22.749 --> 00:08:24.734
And then we looked at the brain activity.

00:08:24.758 --> 00:08:26.566
I will try to condense this for you.

00:08:26.590 --> 00:08:30.070
These are contrast maps that are showing
subtractions between what changes

00:08:30.094 --> 00:08:33.190
when you're improvising
vs. when you're doing something memorized.

00:08:33.214 --> 00:08:35.999
In red is an area that's active
in the prefrontal cortex,

00:08:36.023 --> 00:08:37.482
the frontal lobe of the brain,

00:08:37.506 --> 00:08:39.684
and in blue is this area
that was deactivated.

00:08:39.708 --> 00:08:42.585
So we had this focal area
called the medial prefrontal cortex

00:08:42.609 --> 00:08:43.996
that went way up in activity.

00:08:44.020 --> 00:08:47.250
We had this broad patch of area
called the lateral prefrontal cortex

00:08:47.274 --> 00:08:48.799
that went way down in activity,

00:08:48.823 --> 00:08:50.311
I'll summarize that for you.

00:08:50.335 --> 00:08:52.443
These are multifunctional
areas of the brain,

00:08:52.467 --> 00:08:54.622
these are not the jazz areas of the brain.

00:08:54.646 --> 00:08:56.574
They do a whole host of things

00:08:56.598 --> 00:08:58.457
that have to do with self-reflection,

00:08:58.481 --> 00:09:00.841
introspection, working memory etc.

00:09:00.865 --> 00:09:03.352
Really, consciousness is seated
in the frontal lobe.

00:09:03.376 --> 00:09:05.410
But we have this combination

00:09:05.434 --> 00:09:08.883
of an area that's thought to be involved
in self-monitoring, turning off,

00:09:08.907 --> 00:09:11.370
and this area that's thought
to be autobiographical,

00:09:11.394 --> 00:09:12.929
or self-expressive, turning on.

00:09:12.953 --> 00:09:15.024
We think, at least in this preliminary --

00:09:15.048 --> 00:09:17.801
it's one study; it's probably wrong,
but it's one study --

00:09:17.825 --> 00:09:18.864
(Laughter)

00:09:18.888 --> 00:09:21.619
we think that at least
a reasonable hypothesis

00:09:21.643 --> 00:09:22.804
is that, to be creative,

00:09:22.828 --> 00:09:25.704
you should have this weird dissociation
in your frontal lobe.

00:09:25.728 --> 00:09:28.252
One area turns on,
and a big area shuts off,

00:09:28.276 --> 00:09:31.214
so that you're not inhibited,
you're willing to make mistakes,

00:09:31.238 --> 00:09:33.406
so that you're not constantly
shutting down

00:09:33.430 --> 00:09:35.355
all of these new generative impulses.

00:09:35.379 --> 00:09:39.923
Now a lot of people know that music
is not always a solo activity --

00:09:39.948 --> 00:09:41.668
sometimes it's done communicatively.

00:09:42.092 --> 00:09:43.276
The next question was:

00:09:43.300 --> 00:09:45.872
What happens when musicians
are trading back and forth,

00:09:45.896 --> 00:09:47.509
something called "trading fours,"

00:09:47.533 --> 00:09:50.356
which is something they do
normally in a jazz experiment.

00:09:50.380 --> 00:09:51.793
So this is a 12-bar blues,

00:09:51.817 --> 00:09:53.926
and I've broken it
down into four-bar groups,

00:09:53.950 --> 00:09:55.762
so you would know how you would trade.

00:09:55.786 --> 00:09:58.271
We brought a musician
into the scanner, same way,

00:09:58.296 --> 00:09:59.708
had them memorize this melody

00:09:59.732 --> 00:10:02.298
then had another musician
out in the control room

00:10:02.322 --> 00:10:04.291
trading back and forth interactively.

00:10:07.838 --> 00:10:09.925
This is another video
I'll show you of this.

00:10:09.957 --> 00:10:11.005
(Music)

00:10:11.015 --> 00:10:12.593
So this is a musician, Mike Pope,

00:10:12.618 --> 00:10:15.649
one of the world's best bassists
and a fantastic piano player.

00:10:15.673 --> 00:10:21.369
(Music)

00:10:21.409 --> 00:10:23.722
He's now playing the piece
that we just saw

00:10:24.446 --> 00:10:26.176
a little better than I wrote it.

00:10:26.200 --> 00:10:27.966
(Video) CL: Mike, come on in.

00:10:27.990 --> 00:10:29.760
Mike Pope: May the force be with you.

00:10:29.784 --> 00:10:31.550
Nurse: Nothing in your pockets, Mike?

00:10:31.574 --> 00:10:33.117
MP: No. Nothing's in my pockets.

00:10:42.377 --> 00:10:45.155
CL: You have to have the right
attitude to agree to do it.

00:10:45.179 --> 00:10:46.435
(Laughter)

00:10:46.459 --> 00:10:48.274
It's kind of fun, actually.

00:10:48.298 --> 00:10:49.897
(Music)

00:10:49.921 --> 00:10:51.620
Now we're playing back and forth.

00:10:51.644 --> 00:10:53.856
He's in there.
You can see his legs up there.

00:10:53.880 --> 00:10:55.222
(Music)

00:10:55.246 --> 00:10:58.436
And then I'm in the control room here,
playing back and forth.

00:10:58.460 --> 00:11:05.460
(Music)

00:11:07.930 --> 00:11:09.080
(Music ends)

00:11:09.800 --> 00:11:13.144
(Video) Mike Pope:
This is a pretty good representation

00:11:13.168 --> 00:11:14.952
of what it's like.

00:11:14.976 --> 00:11:16.976
And it's good that it's not too quick.

00:11:17.000 --> 00:11:19.579
The fact that we do it over and over again

00:11:19.603 --> 00:11:22.873
lets you acclimate to your surroundings.

00:11:23.833 --> 00:11:26.491
So the hardest thing for me
was the kinesthetic thing,

00:11:26.515 --> 00:11:29.776
looking at my hands through two mirrors,

00:11:29.800 --> 00:11:31.776
laying on my back,

00:11:31.800 --> 00:11:34.478
and not able to move at all
except for my hand.

00:11:34.502 --> 00:11:36.374
That was challenging.

00:11:36.398 --> 00:11:37.548
But again --

00:11:38.752 --> 00:11:41.538
there were moments, for sure --

00:11:41.562 --> 00:11:42.563
(Laughter)

00:11:42.587 --> 00:11:46.950
there were moments of real, honest-to-God
musical interplay, for sure.

00:11:48.286 --> 00:11:50.288
CL: At this point,
I'll take a few moments.

00:11:50.312 --> 00:11:52.193
So what you're seeing here --

00:11:52.217 --> 00:11:54.294
and I'm doing a cardinal sin in science,

00:11:54.318 --> 00:11:56.128
which is to show you preliminary data.

00:11:56.152 --> 00:11:57.905
This is one subject's data.

00:11:57.929 --> 00:11:59.676
This is, in fact, Mike Pope's data.

00:11:59.700 --> 00:12:01.176
So what am I showing you here?

00:12:01.200 --> 00:12:05.311
When he was trading fours with me,
improvising vs. memorized,

00:12:05.735 --> 00:12:08.484
his language areas lit up,
his Broca's area,

00:12:08.508 --> 00:12:10.732
in the inferior frontal gyrus on the left.

00:12:11.494 --> 00:12:13.403
He had it also homologous on the right.

00:12:13.427 --> 00:12:16.586
This is an area thought to be
involved in expressive communication.

00:12:16.610 --> 00:12:18.738
This whole notion
that music is a language --

00:12:18.762 --> 00:12:21.061
maybe there's a neurologic
basis to it after all,

00:12:21.085 --> 00:12:24.439
and we can see it when two musicians
are having a musical conversation.

00:12:24.463 --> 00:12:26.735
So we've done this on eight subjects now,

00:12:26.760 --> 00:12:28.689
and we're getting all the data together,

00:12:28.713 --> 00:12:31.538
hopefully we'll have something
to say about it meaningfully.

00:12:31.562 --> 00:12:34.805
Now when I think about improvisation
and the language, what's next?

00:12:34.829 --> 00:12:37.076
Rap, of course, rap -- freestyle.

00:12:37.700 --> 00:12:40.447
I've always been fascinated by freestyle.

00:12:40.471 --> 00:12:41.984
And let's play this video.

00:12:42.008 --> 00:12:44.846
(Video) Mos Def: Brown skin I be,
standing five-ten I be

00:12:44.870 --> 00:12:46.892
Rockin' it when I be, in your vicinity

00:12:46.916 --> 00:12:48.887
Whole-style synergy, recognize symmetry

00:12:48.960 --> 00:12:51.294
Go and try to injure me,
broke 'em down chemically

00:12:51.318 --> 00:12:53.747
Ain't the number 10 MC,
talk about how been I be

00:12:53.771 --> 00:12:56.169
Styled it like Kennedy,
late like a 10 to three

00:12:56.193 --> 00:12:59.610
When I say when I be,
girls say bend that key cut

00:12:59.635 --> 00:13:01.453
CL: So there's a lot of analogy

00:13:01.477 --> 00:13:03.933
between what takes place
in freestyle rap and jazz.

00:13:03.957 --> 00:13:06.874
There are a lot of correlates
between the two forms of music,

00:13:06.898 --> 00:13:09.345
I think, in different time periods,
in lot of ways,

00:13:09.369 --> 00:13:12.200
rap serves the same social function
that jazz used to serve.

00:13:12.224 --> 00:13:14.117
So how do you study rap scientifically?

00:13:14.141 --> 00:13:17.276
And my colleagues think I'm crazy,
but I think it's very viable.

00:13:17.300 --> 00:13:18.527
This is what you do:

00:13:18.551 --> 00:13:21.298
You have a freestyle artist come
and memorize a rap

00:13:21.322 --> 00:13:22.543
that you write for them,

00:13:22.567 --> 00:13:25.999
that they've never heard before,
and then you have them freestyle.

00:13:26.023 --> 00:13:28.441
So I told my lab members
that I would rap for TED,

00:13:28.465 --> 00:13:30.107
and they said, "No, you won't."

00:13:30.131 --> 00:13:31.334
And then I thought --

00:13:31.358 --> 00:13:32.674
(Laughter)

00:13:32.698 --> 00:13:38.424
(Applause)

00:13:38.448 --> 00:13:39.728
But here's the thing.

00:13:39.752 --> 00:13:42.653
With this big screen,
you can all rap with me. OK?

00:13:42.677 --> 00:13:44.521
So what we had them do

00:13:44.545 --> 00:13:47.141
was memorize this lower-left
sound icon, please.

00:13:47.165 --> 00:13:50.058
This is the control condition.
This is what they memorized.

00:13:50.082 --> 00:13:52.115
Computer: Memory, thump.

00:13:52.139 --> 00:13:54.276
CL: Thump of the beat in a known repeat

00:13:54.300 --> 00:13:57.006
Rhythm and rhyme, they make me complete

00:13:57.031 --> 00:13:59.096
The climb is sublime when I'm on the mic

00:13:59.120 --> 00:14:01.676
Spittin' rhymes that hit you
like a lightning strike

00:14:01.700 --> 00:14:02.864
Computer: Search.

00:14:02.888 --> 00:14:05.232
CL: I search for the truth
in this eternal quest

00:14:05.256 --> 00:14:07.986
My passion's not fashion,
you can see how I'm dressed

00:14:08.010 --> 00:14:09.976
Psychopathic words in my head appear

00:14:10.000 --> 00:14:12.238
Whisper these lyrics only I can hear

00:14:12.262 --> 00:14:13.434
Computer: Art.

00:14:13.458 --> 00:14:16.088
CL: The art of discovering
and that which is hovering

00:14:16.112 --> 00:14:17.976
Inside the mind of those unconfined

00:14:18.000 --> 00:14:20.976
All of these words keep
pouring out like rain

00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:23.735
I need a mad scientist to check my brain

00:14:23.759 --> 00:14:25.066
Computer: Stop.

00:14:25.090 --> 00:14:32.090
(Applause)

00:14:34.270 --> 00:14:36.444
I guarantee you
that will never happen again.

00:14:36.468 --> 00:14:38.409
(Laughter)

00:14:38.433 --> 00:14:40.621
So now, what's great
about these free-stylers,

00:14:40.645 --> 00:14:42.507
they will get cued different words.

00:14:42.531 --> 00:14:43.975
They don't know what's coming,

00:14:43.999 --> 00:14:45.915
but they'll hear something off the cuff.

00:14:45.939 --> 00:14:47.348
Go hit that right sound icon,

00:14:47.372 --> 00:14:50.092
there will be cued three square words:
like, not and head.

00:14:50.116 --> 00:14:52.270
He doesn't know what's coming.
Computer: Like.

00:14:52.294 --> 00:14:54.064
Freestyler: I'm like some kind of

00:14:54.088 --> 00:14:56.317
extraterrestrial, celestial scene

00:14:56.341 --> 00:14:59.178
Back in the days, I used to sit
in pyramids and meditate

00:14:59.202 --> 00:15:01.375
With two microphones -- Computer: Head

00:15:01.399 --> 00:15:02.733
hovering over my head

00:15:02.757 --> 00:15:04.120
See if I could still listen,

00:15:04.144 --> 00:15:05.431
spittin' off the sound

00:15:05.455 --> 00:15:06.640
See what you grinning

00:15:06.664 --> 00:15:09.089
I teach the children
in the back of the classroom

00:15:09.113 --> 00:15:11.510
About the message of apocalyptical

00:15:11.534 --> 00:15:12.694
Computer: Not.

00:15:12.718 --> 00:15:15.346
Not really though,
'cause I've got to keep it simple

00:15:15.370 --> 00:15:16.976
instrumental

00:15:17.000 --> 00:15:19.976
Detrimental playing Super Mario

00:15:20.000 --> 00:15:23.153
boxes [unclear] hip hop

00:15:23.177 --> 00:15:24.597
Computer: Stop.

00:15:24.621 --> 00:15:26.932
CL: It's an incredible
thing that's taking place.

00:15:26.956 --> 00:15:29.182
It's doing something
neurologically remarkable.

00:15:29.206 --> 00:15:31.522
Whether or not you like
the music is irrelevant.

00:15:31.546 --> 00:15:33.947
Creatively speaking,
it's just a phenomenal thing.

00:15:33.971 --> 00:15:36.487
This is a short video
of how we do this in a scanner.

00:15:36.511 --> 00:15:38.026
[fMRI of Hip-Hop Rap]

00:15:38.050 --> 00:15:39.186
(Laughter)

00:15:39.210 --> 00:15:40.984
(Video) CL: We're here with Emmanuel.

00:15:41.008 --> 00:15:43.314
CL: That was recorded
in the scanner, by the way.

00:15:43.338 --> 00:15:45.447
(Video) CL: That's Emmanuel
in the scanner.

00:15:46.000 --> 00:15:48.000
He's just memorized a rhyme for us.

00:15:49.042 --> 00:15:51.725
[Control Condition Memorized Verses]

00:15:52.249 --> 00:15:54.476
Emmanuel: Top of the beat with no repeat

00:15:54.500 --> 00:15:57.476
Rhythm and rhyme make me complete

00:15:57.500 --> 00:16:00.476
Climb is sublime when I'm on the mic

00:16:00.500 --> 00:16:03.274
Spittin' rhymes that'll hit you
like a lightning strike

00:16:03.298 --> 00:16:04.456
Computer: Search.

00:16:04.480 --> 00:16:06.740
I search for the truth
in this eternal quest

00:16:06.764 --> 00:16:09.340
I'm passing on fashion;
you can see how I'm dressed

00:16:09.364 --> 00:16:12.427
CL: I'm going to stop that there;
so what do we see in his brain?

00:16:12.451 --> 00:16:14.109
This is four rappers' brains.

00:16:14.133 --> 00:16:16.169
And we do see language areas lighting up,

00:16:16.193 --> 00:16:17.476
but then, eyes closed --

00:16:17.500 --> 00:16:20.813
when you are freestyling vs. memorizing,

00:16:20.837 --> 00:16:22.991
you've got major visual areas lighting up.

00:16:23.015 --> 00:16:26.704
You've got major cerebellar activity,
which is involved in motor coordination.

00:16:26.728 --> 00:16:30.084
You have heightened brain activity
when you're doing a comparable task,

00:16:30.108 --> 00:16:33.066
when that one task is creative
and the other task is memorized.

00:16:33.090 --> 00:16:35.874
It's very preliminary,
but I think it's kind of cool.

00:16:35.898 --> 00:16:38.206
To conclude, we've got
a lot of questions to ask,

00:16:38.230 --> 00:16:41.135
and like I said, we'll ask questions
here, not answer them.

00:16:41.159 --> 00:16:44.610
But we want to get at the root
of what is creative genius neurologically,

00:16:44.634 --> 00:16:47.191
and I think, with these methods,
we're getting close.

00:16:47.215 --> 00:16:49.518
And I think, hopefully
in the next 10, 20 years,

00:16:49.542 --> 00:16:51.439
you'll see real, meaningful studies

00:16:51.463 --> 00:16:54.476
that say science has to catch up to art,

00:16:54.500 --> 00:16:56.888
and maybe we're starting now to get there.

00:16:56.912 --> 00:16:58.910
Thank you for your time.

00:16:58.934 --> 00:17:02.942
(Applause)