eat less; eat even less; fast once in a while; exercise regularly
I've recognized the effects this has on my own brain, and you're absolutely right (for me, at least). And it makes me wonder about the origins of this particular chemical pattern, and how it came to be.
Perhaps it's some kind of evolutionary mechanism: back in the hunter/gatherer days, when food was scarce, those who had the particular genome to trigger the production of just the right set of chemicals for brain plasticity on an empty stomach were better able to form the neural pathways required for hunting and gathering food, thus able to survive.
This is a very good hypothesis. The underlying mechanisms may be older. The main culprits I have read are due to a reduction of insulin levels and an upregulation of stress/heat shock proteins.
The book has some discussion that supports this idea, including the suggestion that we survived a famine that Neanderthals / Cro-Magnon / others couldn't.
I've recognized the effects this has on my own brain, and you're absolutely right (for me, at least). And it makes me wonder about the origins of this particular chemical pattern, and how it came to be.
Perhaps it's some kind of evolutionary mechanism: back in the hunter/gatherer days, when food was scarce, those who had the particular genome to trigger the production of just the right set of chemicals for brain plasticity on an empty stomach were better able to form the neural pathways required for hunting and gathering food, thus able to survive.