Tuesday 9 November 2010

Hitler's Brain

Last night I dreamed of Hitler's brain. It had been sliced up roughly and put in a casserole dish. I looked down at it and felt privileged to view the tissue that had ordered the invasion of Russia.

As I came to and hovered in that pleasant realm between dreams and morning cups of tea, I thought there must be a set of neurones that when fired, make one invade Russia and do all sorts of other crazy things, such as watching Celebrity Come Dancing or Eastenders. Between those that induce watching the latter and those that make one invade Russia there must be an overlap, as surely, the neurones for 'East', 'End', and 'Murder' are involved both activities.

Which makes me think- or sets off lots neurones abuzzing-  that a Mad Neuroscientist might infiltrate the Eastenders script writing team and devise a means of inducing some kind of electronic glitch in the viewers' brains so that they collectively rush out and invade Russia.

Or perhaps I've got it all wrong. Perhaps we just bully our brains into doing bad things. What would Hitler's brain say? I said to him, Adolf, you dumb schmekel, use your brain [i.e. ME] ! DO NOT invade Russia. It'll all end in tears. Don't say I didn't warn you! But that schmuck went and did it any way and now I get the blame. You don't know what it's like being inside the head of a madman!


Then if his brain wrote his [or her] Confessions the other organs might want to cash in. We might, for example, have The Dropped Bollock: I was Adolf' Hitler's lost testicle.

Just had a nasty thought [well another one]: if brains are to blame and there is a brain cell for everything, would it be possible for our Mad Neuroscientist to fire off the set of neurones that would make me think I am Sarah Palin, don a Grayson Perry frock, climb up a telegraph pole and sit up there singing 'I'm forever blowing bubbles, pretty bubbles in the air'? And would I be sectioned or would I win the Turner Prize?

Anything is possible.


2 comments:

Unknown said...

Reminds me of a documentary I saw a few years ago called 'Are Brains Really Necessary?' It focused mostly on severe head traumas...more on those in a moment..but there was a maths graduate from Harvard who began complaining of persistent headaches and upon doing a brain scan they discovered that he had only a thin veneer of brain on the inside of his skull and everything else was water.
Perhaps they should have re-named the documentary, ' Are Brains Really Necessary to Study Math at Harvard?
There was also the fascinating case of a man who worked in the mining industry setting explosive charges. ( Maybe he didn't start out with much grey matter in the first place choosing a job like that!) Anyway, one day a charge went off prematurely and blew a 2" piece of pipe right through his forehead and out the other side. The surgeons could wave at each other from each side. But rather than being wheeled off to a windowless room to eat dinners through straws and stare at the floor all day he made a complete recovery and went back to the same job! I guess they just put a cork on each end and sent him on his way.
This is a nice segue to the very dodgy practice of self-trepanation. Proponents argue that the holes increase oxygen supply to the brain and can therefore increase intelligence as well as psychic powers. Again, I would argue that they haven't much to lose in the first place and maybe an extra hole in the head is exactly what they need.

Hitlers brain was fortunately boiled in his skull in a flaming ditch covered in petrol. And as famous historians have pointed out its what the mass murdering fuck-head deserved. Toynbee I think.

Phil Ashcroft said...

Well John, Nice of you to comment. Much food for thought. Our realtionship to our brains is not one to be understood in scientific, common sense or theological cliches. Personally I don't know how it should be understood. Perhps it can't be, or only by a being functioning in more dimensions. I'm very sceptical of pop science, in particular, you know the kind of stuff that says ' we've now found the neurone that has a little spasm when you look at photo of Jordan or Cliff Richard'. That doesn't explain a lot. Same kind of problem as when they say 'they've now found a gene for scratching your backside [or whatever]'. I was in my own inimitable way making that point in my blog entry.

Just thinking back to my SD experience. Several different selves in action plus time curving plus lots of architecture made from bricks. Weird.