now suggested by many facts is that inhibition is irradiation or long
circuiting to higher and more complex brain areas, so that the energy,
whether spontaneous or reflex, is diverted to be used elsewhere. These
combinations are of a higher order, more remote from reflex action,
and modified by some Jacksonian third level.[9] Action is now not from
independent centers, but these are slowly associated, so that
excitation may flow off from one point to any other and any reaction
may result from any stimulus.

The more unified the brain the less it suffers from localization, and
the lower is the level to which any one function can exhaust the
whole. The tendency of each group of cells to discharge or overflow
into those of lower tension than themselves increases as
correspondence in time and space widens. The more one of a number of
activities gains in power to draw on all the brain, or the more
readily the active parts are fed at cost of the resting parts, the
less is rest to be found in change from one of these activities to
another, and the less do concentration and specialization prove to be
dangerous. Before, the aim was to wake all parts to function; now it
is to connect them. Intensity of this cross-section activity now tends
to unity, so that all parts of the brain energize together. In a brain
with this switchboard function well organized, each reaction has grown
independent of its own stimulus and may result from any stimulation,
and each act, e.g., a finger movement of a peculiar nature, may tire
the whole brain. This helps us to understand why brain-workers so
often excel laborers not only in sudden dynamometric strength test,
but in sustained and long-enduring effort. In a good brain or in a
good machine, power may thus be developed over a large surface, and
all of it applied to a small one, and hence the dangers of
specialization are lessened in exact proportion as the elements of our