This myth has artificially delayed the beginning of active parenthood and prevented public recognition that newborns are persons. In retrospect, brain experts made one of the classical errors of science by dissecting the brain to find out how it works. The problem is that the brain works properly only if it is whole. Separate parts are not the system. Most serious was the error of severing the brain from its connections with two other systems, the endocrine and immune systems.
Current research shows all three are elegantly linked in one fluid central intelligence system.
That the whole brain is more than its parts is illustrated by a debate that has lasted for decades over the myelin sheathing that insulates nerve fibers. I ran into this wall personally when I started to tell colleagues about the birth memories my clients were reporting. Their immediate reaction was that such memories were impossible because the myelination of nerve tracks was not complete at birth and therefore signals could not flow properly through the nervous system. The truth is that myelination begins in some places only a few weeks after conception but is not completed until adolescence. It is no measure of what a baby's brain can do.