BBC Focus Magazine

[scott fairbrass]

how much information can the human brain hold, and can it ever get full? and if it can get full what happens to any new information it recieves

[M Paul Lloyd]

Ah... I'm pretty sure this was a question in the magazine not so long ago....... shame I can't recall anything else about it though... best go have a rumage........ but the figure of 800 terabytes comes to mind for some reason.

As for it getting full, well like a computer I think that old memories could get overwritten so it would never actually get full. Possibly?

[MikeG]

I seem to remember the case of a woman that can recall every single day of her life since childhood. That must be a lot of terabytes

[Lateralman]

If our brains ever get full, we British cope with the overflow with our brain drain.

[Shadowwolf]

As for it getting full, well like a computer I think that old memories could get overwritten so it would never actually get full.

Have you tried defragging, or clean disk?

[ChrisH]

Who knows, maybe one day you'll be able to ram a usb stick up your nose to increase memory. Probably not though.

[MikeG]

Here's a link for "the woman who can't forget", if interested.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/t/story?id=4813052&page=1

[M Paul Lloyd]

As for it getting full, well like a computer I think that old memories could get overwritten so it would never actually get full.

Have you tried defragging, or clean disk?

[Lateralman]

The answer is simple, if your brain gets too full, you fall over.