Posted on Jul 7, 2017
The Backwards Brain Bicycle - Smarter Every Day 133
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This is fascinating. Formulate your answer to this question before watching the video: could you ride a bike that was engineered to turn left when you turn the bars right and vice versa? I was absolutely sure it'd be no problem. Then I watched this. Shout out to PO1 Robert Payne for turning me on to this educational channel.
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Your brain could respond to it and learn the system, but it would be a long adaptive process.
I also think the guy missed something in his analysis. I believe that when riding a normal bike, the steering control is intuitive. In the learning process, it's tricky learning the balance, how to lean into the turn, how much to control the steering, coordinating the steering with the pedaling, etc., but I think turning left to go left and turning right to go right is something our brains already understand. Turning right to go left and turning left to go right is something our brains do not understand, so they have to be taught. To put it another way, I'm guessing that if two children with identical brains tried to learn how to ride a bike for the first time, one using a regular bike and one using a backwards bike, the one learning on a backwards bike would take longer to learn the skill, because the child's brain would have to fight itself a little bit before succeeding. I could be wrong, but that's my theory.
I also think the guy missed something in his analysis. I believe that when riding a normal bike, the steering control is intuitive. In the learning process, it's tricky learning the balance, how to lean into the turn, how much to control the steering, coordinating the steering with the pedaling, etc., but I think turning left to go left and turning right to go right is something our brains already understand. Turning right to go left and turning left to go right is something our brains do not understand, so they have to be taught. To put it another way, I'm guessing that if two children with identical brains tried to learn how to ride a bike for the first time, one using a regular bike and one using a backwards bike, the one learning on a backwards bike would take longer to learn the skill, because the child's brain would have to fight itself a little bit before succeeding. I could be wrong, but that's my theory.
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OK, so I'm writing this before I watch the video or view any comments. It depends on the age you start learning. Bikes are about balance. We learn from a left-is-left/right-is-right sense of balance... that is, your body shifts appropriate when anticipating the turn, and its subsequent movements are appropriately balanced to handle the change in equilibrium. This response becomes imperceptible... you eventually learn to do it without even thinking about it. Now, if you've already learned how to ride a bike, learning a new approach will be more difficult. Why? Two reasons. First, your natural inclination for hand/arm movement is the left-left/right-right method, and you have to actively fight against this. Second, your body is already shifting to anticipate the turn, including the shift from your hand/arm movements to make the turn. Even if you overcome the first part, the second part will be thrown off because your body is adjusted wrong for balance, you will shift your weight again and overcompensate or revert to previous knowns, and subsequently fall. In effect, you will have to retrain your brain, which is not an easy task.
For comparison, when I was a child playing video games with a joystick, I would hold the joystick at a quarter turn from normal position. Up was to the left, and Left was pulling down. I don't know why I started doing this, but I just did. Meanwhile, playing arcade games where the stick was normal, I had no problems adjusting, either. My brain was trained both ways, and I could react accordingly to whatever method I used. Turn the stick a quarter turn the other direction, though, and I was completely lost. I knew the directions in my head, but my natural reactions were completely inverted. Anyway, it's interesting what the brain can and cannot do easily.
For comparison, when I was a child playing video games with a joystick, I would hold the joystick at a quarter turn from normal position. Up was to the left, and Left was pulling down. I don't know why I started doing this, but I just did. Meanwhile, playing arcade games where the stick was normal, I had no problems adjusting, either. My brain was trained both ways, and I could react accordingly to whatever method I used. Turn the stick a quarter turn the other direction, though, and I was completely lost. I knew the directions in my head, but my natural reactions were completely inverted. Anyway, it's interesting what the brain can and cannot do easily.
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SSgt Ryan Sylvester
SN Greg Wright - OK, so now that gets even trickier. Building up momentum takes a enormous amount of force to break inertia, so even fighting to achieve balance while starting to ride is impossible because you actively have to exert force to one side, causing the bike the shift to that side. We compensate for this by turning the wheel in the direction of the force, which is natural because the hand is the same side as the foot, and the movements are symmetrical. Same with the shift to the other side to continue building momentum. And if you're really good, it only takes two such shifts and your moving at sufficient speed to maintain a straight line. This foxtrotting thing... so as you're pushing down on one foot, you're pushing forward with that hand rather than pulling back, which means you have to shift back and to the direction of force to maintain balance, instead of forward and away. Or, you're pulling back with the opposite hand, which is an even more unnatural movement and you're probably going to overshift and overcompensate and fall.
Cripes. Yeah, this would be... there's absolutely no way I'd even want to put the time and effort into learning it, lol.
Cripes. Yeah, this would be... there's absolutely no way I'd even want to put the time and effort into learning it, lol.
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SN Greg Wright
SSgt Ryan Sylvester - This was really an eye-opener for me. I initially scoffed when someone asked me this. The underlying matter is (which you describe fairly well) that, as he says, there's a hugely complicated algorithm your brain calculates to ride a bike, that almost no one ever thinks about because your lizard brain is doing it. Change a single variable and...you get the video results. I also found it fascinating that a young brain could learn it so much faster than a mature one.
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SSgt Ryan Sylvester
SN Greg Wright - Well, he calls it plasticity, but yeah... a child's mind is more malleable. Children can pick up such concepts a heck of a lot faster than adults, even though they probably don't fully understand the "why" of it. They don't know the underlying forces at work, they just know do this and this to make that result.
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SSgt Ryan Sylvester
SN Greg Wright - So, I've thought about it a little further from how I've learned to ride a bike. Watched the vid again. I noticed something else here. He's failing to start the bike up partly because of positioning. Meaning, he's anticipating a difficulty and is likely starting to ride in an upright position as a result. But that's not a racing bike (which practically requires you to start upright because of the frame and wheels). When I rode a mountain bike, my normal method of starting wasn't to gain momentum upright. I would start out by rocking the bike left and right, which actually doesn't require turning the wheel... just using downward force on the handlebars as weight shifts opposite the applied forced to the pedals, in order to maintain balance. The wheel itself is kept straight, and the rocking lessens as momentum increases until you can ride upright with sufficient momentum to maintain a natural straight line. Of course, that doesn't negate what I said about turning at all, but seems like there's an easier way to start the bike with the already-learned tendencies. I'd have to test it out to know for sure, and until then all of this is simply conjecture. Still, it'd be interesting to see if there's something to that.
Then again, there is a problem with the curvature of the handlebars, which is not like a mountain bike's straight bar... plus there's no telling how the handlebars are going to react to a rocking motion thanks to the "reverse engineering". Like I said, only something that could be known by testing it out.
Then again, there is a problem with the curvature of the handlebars, which is not like a mountain bike's straight bar... plus there's no telling how the handlebars are going to react to a rocking motion thanks to the "reverse engineering". Like I said, only something that could be known by testing it out.
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SN Greg Wright
It was fascinating to me that it took him EIGHT MONTHS to learn to ride it, but only took his young son 2 weeks. That speaks VOLUMES to how the brain works at different ages.
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PO3 Steven Sherrill
SN Greg Wright - I think that it would also be easier for an adult who didn't already know how to ride a bike. Being that they wouldn't already be accustomed to how a normal bike works, they may find it easier to learn this bike. Maybe he should put on training wheels?
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