12/21/2002 10:03:00 PM

the way that the brain is wired is constantly changing in response to new realities. this is called plasticity. this capacity to invent/uninvent the circuitry of our existence is the basis for our shifting identity over time. the very process of change makes us who we are. just reading this has fired a tiny change in the connections that form you. plasticity is the you that others think of in reference to you. think of the old woman in the nursing home without the plasticity she once had. she is remembered in the vibrancy of her plasticity not in the catatonic moments of plasticity’s demise. though loved in these moments as the sacred remains of what once was this sad, quiet ending lived in memories as-if they were the present underscores the centrality of plasticity for identity. the slow downward spiral in plasticity is the slow creep toward nonexistence for any organism.