I saw an old thread from another website that talked about the percentage of the brain being used. But I wasnt quite satisfied with the answers given, not because I beleive them to be wrong; I just don't think that their question was direct enough.

I have been told that we only use 10% of our brain, and I've also been told that its a myth. I've seen a few people's opinions on the matter and I dont think anyones really on the same page with it, giving different answers/opinions. It really depends on how you look at the question.
If someone says "Do we really only use 10% of our brain?", the literal answer is no. Because much more than 10% of the physical brain is used while doing something that requires mental energy. The more activity going on up there the more of itself it uses. I'm leaning more towards the 10% being the capacity that the brain can use.

The only way i can really describe it is like a computers RAM. Your computer may have 320G in its HDD. You can access it all, but if you ran the same amount of memory on two computers with different RAM's the percentage of its CPU usage will vary. So if you use more than that average 10 percent, your brain will use its functions more easily and efficiently. Making the person smarter in general and able to use more of the brain at once.

So I guess what im really trying to ask is whether or not the 10% myth is actually true if looked at like a capacity to use whats stored in the brain.
sorry about the lead up to the question, i just needed to explain what was on my mind regarding it.

Does anyone get where im coming from?

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The whole brain is metabolising continuously, and the neurons themselves are firing very frequently. What we're missing is how fully the neurons integrate in order to deal with thinking and memory and sensory integration. At that point, it's more that just metabolism.

In cognitive neuroscience, we find that specific regions of the brain can have their capability increased. This comes at an opportunity cost to other regions, but this opportunity cost is mostly in the form of focus (concentration) and not in lost potential. A person who trains in the violin will develop better brain regions for playing the violin, but their ability to have a good vocabulary is not diminished (except for the fact that they could've been practicing vocabulary instead).

Muscle is a decent analogy. Do we only use 10% of our strength? Maybe. Obviously, you cannot use ALL of your strength ALL the time, but we can certainly modify our biology so that specific strength potential is improved

No time to check at the moment but AFAIK, Some (long forgotten) study revealed that we use approx 100% of our brain, but we use approx max 10% of it at any one time. This I believe sparked the initial confusion and was swiftly jumped upon and wheeled out by those who are desperate to convince us that the material brain is not responsible for certain"functions" and that there must be some other [insert mystical explanation] for "higher brain functions" etc. Or something like that.