Eli5: How can we move almost any muscle the time we want? How does the brain knows it’s that specific muscle that you want to move?

Question

Like, I can be there just sitting and think. “Now I’m gonna move my middle finger”, and just do it, no reason at all. How does the brain know what muscle is each, how does a signal is determined to make you move the finger you want? Does the brain have a “map” or something of every muscle in your body?

In: Biology

Answer 1

I think it learns which nerve moves which muscle. For example, I had shoulder surgery, and my skins nerves kinda got “switched”. I would touch here, but would feel it there. It took a while, but my brain eventually rewired itself so touching where I thought I would touch, felt the correct location.