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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 5413716" data-attributes="member: 177">A note (mostly for those who are trying to make sure players don't go farther than you want with powers):  While the brain runs on "electrical impulses" that doesn't mean the power works on the nervous system.When we talk about electricity, in terms of wires and modern electronics, we are talking about electrons moving along the length of a conductor, driven by a potential (an electric field).  The electrons move continuously in one direction for Direct Current (DC), and go back and forth over a short distance for Alternating Current (AC).This is *not* how your neurons do things.  To oversimplify - imagine the neuron to be a pipe.  The neuron transmits an electrical signal by moving ions (charged atoms) not along the length of the pipe, but through the wall of the pipe. Ions pop out in one place, which causes more to pop out next to them a little way down the pipe, then next to those a little farther down.  Each ion moves only a small distance across the cell membrane, and back again, and that produces a wave of ionization to travel along the length of the neuron.Also, the electrons in the first case are extremely light.  The charged ions are a hundred thousand times more massive than electrons.So, you can imagine it this way - normal electricity is like filling a sports stadium with Capuchin monkeys, and having them run around the rim of the stadium.  The electricity in neurons is like filling a stadium with elephants, and having them do "the wave".  Not really the same thing at all.</blockquote>

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