Biology 202 Neurobiology and Behavior Spring 2004

Just thought I'd add that to the forum

And on the topic of free will versus seemingly free will. Someone said that they have free will because they can imagine themselves having done something else than what they did in a given situation. However, you did NOT do something else, you did what you did. There is no proof, therefore, that you COULD have done anything else in that situation given your mental state and your individual brain.

Another story on percieved free will. There is a type of wasp who lays her eggs in a paralysed caterpillar for her children to eat when they hatch. She proceeds methodically, finding a suitable caterpillar, paralyzing it with her venom, dragging it back to her hole, leaving the caterpillar at the entrance to her hole and going inside to make sure it is still safe and empty, coming back out and dragging the caterpillar in to lay her eggs on.
BUT, if you wait until she has gone into her hole to check, and you move the caterpillar an inch, she will drag the caterpillar back to the entrance of her hole and go back inside to check. She will do this forever if you keep moving the caterpillar. What seemed to be willed behavior is revealed as a loop, programmed in.

How much of our behavior consists of loops like this? Perhaps even some we believe we have control over is one, and part of our brain is assuring the I-function that it is in control in order to maintain sanity?

Just some thoughts

I'm not exactly sure if this is opposite to what Paul Grobstein was saying in class because decerebrate pusturing is pretty much a last resort response to try and salvage the CNS. However, it seemed to me that he was describing decorticate posturing in class with upper extremity flexion. In either case I'm not sure I clearly understand the reversal from decorticate to decerebrate...But I could get you to the hospital safely if I see it!

*-This info is from The Basic EMT; 2nd Edition. McSwain, Norman E. and Paturas, James L..

http://www2.uic.edu/stud_orgs/prof/M2/courses/pathophysiology/cpp_part3_3-13.pdf

The causes of decorticate vs. decerebrate is damage to the upper motor neurons of the Pons above (decorticate) the red nucleus vs. damage of the motor neurons in the upper midbrain below (decerebrate)the red nucleus. Apparently the exact function of the red nucleus are not well known but it is believed they are highly associated with skilled motor neuron limb movement, especially flexion and extension. A good image of the location of the Red nucleus "Ruber" in the motor neuron path is on

http://128.104.8.64/Bs97/TEXT/P22/S/STICK.HTM

This info goes way beyond our knowledge but its a start at figuring it all out.

Also, i was wondering what everybody thought of "deja-vu" (not sure how to spell it!). What happens when we have a deja-vu episode? Are we remembering part of a dream or we remembering a past occurrance? Most people believe that deja-vu are dreams that we remember at that certain point. But that would mean that we dream about the events that will occur daily? I just dont know!

There are two other similar phenomena that I am curious about. One, Someone mentioned that some people who experience a very traumatic event can later talk about it without getting emotional, but isn't it often common for a person in that situation to speak as if they were not the person effected? I have heard it described as using a "dead" voice, where there is no emotion whatsoever in their voice or body language, is this true?

The other question I have is similar, I have a friend who was abused when she was younger, but now when she remembers the experience she says that she never felt like she was in her body she was always floating above it, so what causes people to have an "out of body" experiences when suffering from trauma?

Last fall break, I was playing football with my sister and managed to fall and dislocate/break my elbow. It popped out and when I landed on it, and I remember thinking that I had gone down too far. I didn't feel any pain and didn't immediately notice my injury as I was wearing long sleeves, but when I went to stand up I couldn't keep my body up. I sat down and turned my head and lifted my sleeve and my family nearby gasped at the sight of the distorted limb.

After getting it set at the hospital, for the next several days I was plagued with the image of myself falling. Again and again I would see it, and each time it would cause me to cringe. It was as if I were reliving the moment - possible because of the lack of pain I initially felt. Still, when I recall my injury I can vividly remember the initial experience of falling and thinking "that wasn't right..."

Two things about this are interesting to me: the lack of pain I initially felt, and my memory of the event. I remember little else, except the initial fall and my brain's ability to play that back over and over again never ceases to amaze me.

And also in response to Erica- "Where do the points on the spectrum between diagnosable disorder and personality trait lie?" - That's a very very neat question, so I'm going to give my opinion. My gut reaction is that it would often not be possible to distinguish between the two. The word "disorder" is a difficult one. All that it truly means, ultimately, is that a person varies from the norm. Varies so much from the norm that it's noticeable, and sometimes debilitating- but still... If a disorder affects a person's personality, like autism (there are plenty of others, I'm sure. I just say autism because I'm slightly obsessed with it.), the person's "true" personality would be the one created by the disorder. If the disorder were cured, somehow- then the person's personality would change. The true personality traits would not have been revealed by the cure- they would've been changed. Personality is a very fluid thing. It's a product of the nervous system, and if a disorder affects the nervous system, the personality produced will be affected as well.

There was an Oliver Sack's story about a man with Tourette's syndrome, that that reminds me of- the disorder was a part of him, a part of his personality, and he got very upset after he was medicated and the symptoms of the disorder left him. The medication had taken away too much of what he was- had changed his personality.

Pain: Pain has always been a really intresting topic for me, especially as an athlete. Coaches and trainers always stress the difference between "pain" and an "injury," defining an injury as the body's inability to perform a certain function because of damage incurred. However, athletes tread such a fine line between the two. They are often encouraged to treat injuries as just "pain," and that they must gut it out for the sake of the team and the game. Once we suffer an injury, and experience the associated pain, I think that this painful experience leaves a residual memory that makes it difficult to recover mentally. For example: I suffered an injury a could of weeks ago where i experienced extreme pain. I altered my workouts in order to rehab this injury, and it took me a long time until I tried doing my "normal" routine again. Every time i experienced pain, no matter how small, I had it set in my mind that i was still "injured." I think it is common to find that athletes or anyone can mentally psych themselves out into thinking that they are hurt, or feeling pain. It seems logical that the longer one is hurt for, the harder it is to return to the normal routine because one may be afraid the injury is still present. If whatever sensation of pain we experience is "real," than how can we differentiate between someone that might be a hypocondriac (they are always afraid they are hurt, or always have some sort of experience of pain) or someone who is really hurt? Medicine comes in here to show us via xrays or tests if there is really an injury, but what if there is no "injury" and pain is still felt?

I thought of this scenario in terms of a card game. We are dealt the cards and given rules to play the hand – what we do with the cards (how we play them) is up to us. Within the given rules our possibilities are endless, however, we can only do so much due to our dealt hand. Could it be possible that the loops and unconscious set-point are the dealt cards and given rules – things we are unaware of and have no possibility of controlling? And our I-function is our conscience attempt to do the best with what we are given? If people are dealt different hands or given different rules, they will act differently than others in the same situation. If this is the case, is it possible for the situation to be flipped in that people realize that they are not acting in a socially acceptable way, but not have any idea as how to change it? Is it possible for the I-function to be aware of what is happening – and that something may be different – but have no idea as to what is specifically wrong? Can you alter "set-points" permanently? Is change possible? In the case of kids growing into teens, and teens becoming adults, what makes people emotionally mature – is it a change in "set-point"? What role does the I-function play in terms of mental growth and awareness?

My cousin was diagnosed with bipolar disorder a few years back. He would forcibly wash his hands and take showers several times a day, and he became this person who cannot hold solid conversations with people because his approach to life became depressive and nihilistic from the depression that accompanied his disorder. Fortunately, with proper medication and therapy over the course of a couple years, he was able to gradually overcome the disorder and now has a much more healthy and positive look on life and is an accomplishing student at school.

I think that the bipolar disorder had affected his personality and the ways that he do things; but once the disease had been properly treated, he was able to continue on with his life without the negativity that had resulted from the disorder.

As for dreams, because of numerous experiences within my life I believe, I often experience violent dreams in which there would be a physical pain in my dream. In this dream, I could feel the pain inflicted, and if or when I woke up, often times the pain would still linger, and not be explainable by anything that could occur when sleeping. What explains this? Are dreams and motor nervous system somehow connected? Would my belief that traumatic events can cause this be true?

Lastly, what about when your limbs fall asleep? How does that effect what you percieve as your "own body?"

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