system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5 If our brain works with electrical pulses, why does an EMP not shut our brain down?
gpt
An EMP knocks out electronics because of something called "inductance." When there are magnetic fields in motion near a conductor (like a wire), electrical currents get induced in the conductor.

An EMP is, roughly, a huge electromagnetic field ripping by, so it induces huge currents in any unshielded electronics and blows them up because the device can't handle those loads.

Our brains don't have wires in them, though. Nerve signals are carried by neurons, which are specialized cells. An electrical pulse travels from one end of the neuron to the other, but the signal is carried chemically from each neuron to the next. So, it's not like there's an uninterrupted electrical current going from one part of the brain to the other: it's really mostly chemical signals.

Neurons are very short and frankly not that conductive, so they don't pick up any induced currents from the EMP.