This video, we're going to be talking about the organization of the brain and there are a couple of different ways to think about the brain, but one of the most common ways is to organize the brain into 3 major divisions. So, the first division is basically depicted here in pink, and this represents pretty much the entire top portion of the brain, and this is known as the forebrain. So, we have the forebrain on top, and then right below the forebrain, this little area in orange here is the midbrain. The midbrain is essentially like the upper portion of the brainstem, and it's very important for functions like movement as well as orientation, so like where you are or understanding where you are in space. And then right below the midbrain, this region depicted here in blue, is the hindbrain. And I know that "hind" often refers to like the back of something, but in this case, think of hind as being like the bottom.
So the forebrain is the top, the midbrain is in the middle, and then the hindbrain is kind of the bottom portion of the brain. And as you can see here, we are defining the midbrain, but we're not defining the forebrain and hindbrain, and that's just because both the forebrain and hindbrain are comprised of multiple very complex structures. So we're going to talk about those in some separate videos coming up for you very soon. Whereas the midbrain is only made up of a few structures, and at this level, you don't really have to know what they are, so this is all that you really need to know about the midbrain. Now, the way that this organization works is that it pretty much goes from the bottom being the simplest functions, and when I say simple, I mean evolutionarily simple.
So, things like breathing, controlling your heart rate, basic elements of movement, sleep, consciousness, things like that. So we say simple functions a lot, but those are all very complex things. They are just evolutionarily considered more simple. And then as we go up in the brain toward the forebrain, that is where we're going to be seeing more complex or evolutionarily complex functions. And those include things like, you know, logical thinking, deductive reasoning, executive functions, etc.
So we have the most complex, evolutionarily complex, functions happening in the forebrain and the simplest evolutionarily simple functions happening in the hindbrain. All right, that is how we organize and kind of think about the structure of the brain, and I'll see you guys in our next video to start talking about the hindbrain in a bit more detail. Bye-bye!
