How Strange the Brain Can Be
By definition, the brain is the command center of the body. It receives and processes enormous amounts of information. That being said, it is a highly complex organ. Like any organ, it is capable of malfunctioning. Neurologist V.S. Ramachandran explores three peculiar syndromes of the brain in the video "3 Clues to Understanding Your Brain." These syndromes include Capgras syndrome, Capgras delusion, and synesthesia. Peculiar names for a peculiar organ, right? To understand the following syndromes, you need to understand the basic anatomy of the brain. The brain is split into four lobes, all of which serve a different function. These are the frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal lobes. These lobes contain …show more content…
First, you must understand what goes on when we see something. It goes in through our eyes and into the visual areas of the brain. Then, it reaches the fusiform gyrus, the face area. After it reaches that, it travels to the amygdyla, which measures the emotional significance of the message. If it is important, the message reaches the autonomic nervous system. The autonomic nervous system controls excitation. What goes wrong in Capgras delusion, is that the pathway between the amygdyla and the autonomic nervous system is severed. This causes someone to recognize their mother, for example, but not experience the warmth that seeing your mother would generally …show more content…
They are important in understanding the wiring of our brains and how they can become damaged. It is important to know what measures we can apply to improve the quality of life for people suffering with these syndromes. Just think of how awful it would be if we couldn 't recognize our own mother. How difficult would life be if we confused our senses? To improve research for these syndromes, one might try to collect more data from more test subjects. However, that may be hard to do because of the rarity of the first two
By definition, the brain is the command center of the body. It receives and processes enormous amounts of information. That being said, it is a highly complex organ. Like any organ, it is capable of malfunctioning. Neurologist V.S. Ramachandran explores three peculiar syndromes of the brain in the video "3 Clues to Understanding Your Brain." These syndromes include Capgras syndrome, Capgras delusion, and synesthesia. Peculiar names for a peculiar organ, right? To understand the following syndromes, you need to understand the basic anatomy of the brain. The brain is split into four lobes, all of which serve a different function. These are the frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal lobes. These lobes contain …show more content…
First, you must understand what goes on when we see something. It goes in through our eyes and into the visual areas of the brain. Then, it reaches the fusiform gyrus, the face area. After it reaches that, it travels to the amygdyla, which measures the emotional significance of the message. If it is important, the message reaches the autonomic nervous system. The autonomic nervous system controls excitation. What goes wrong in Capgras delusion, is that the pathway between the amygdyla and the autonomic nervous system is severed. This causes someone to recognize their mother, for example, but not experience the warmth that seeing your mother would generally …show more content…
They are important in understanding the wiring of our brains and how they can become damaged. It is important to know what measures we can apply to improve the quality of life for people suffering with these syndromes. Just think of how awful it would be if we couldn 't recognize our own mother. How difficult would life be if we confused our senses? To improve research for these syndromes, one might try to collect more data from more test subjects. However, that may be hard to do because of the rarity of the first two