Biology 202

When I was thinking about what kind of book I wanted to review for this assignment, all I knew was that I wanted to learn and think about something new. In the end The Forbidden Experiment by Roger Shattuck grabbed my interest. This 214 page book is extremely interesting and thought provoking, in fact it is one of those books you pick up and don’t want to put down until it is finished. This book retells the story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron and the men who tried to bring him back into society, of whom Itard was the primary teacher of the boy. Shattuck chronicles his life and his progress through documents written by these men, as well as making some conclusions of his own.

As this last paper approached, I was having major difficulties trying to think of a topic to choose. I knew I wanted to do something with a lot of scientific evidence about it, but also something that was still a little bit of a mystery. After searching the internet, I finally came upon a subject that seemed to meet these criteria, Tourette’s syndrome. Tourette’s syndrome was first described in 1885 and since then has only increased in recognition and controversy. (1) Wikipedia defines Tourette’s as, “an inherited neurological disorder with onset in childhood, characterized by the presence of multiple physical (motor) tics and at least on vocal (phonic) tic.” (1) This definition is well and good, but what is the cause of these tics, who do they affect, and what can be done to stop them?

When I was a little girl, about twelve years ago, a brand new sneaker had just hit the market; they were the brand new patent-leather, high-top Reebok classics with a ridged sole. Those shoes were truly amazing, and I remember I just had to have them. My best friend, Heather, had them first and about two weeks later, about half of my neighborhood had those same exact shoes. Of course, with my mother’s salary and my mother’s distaste for the trends of young America, I was one of the last to actually receive these shoes, but when I did get them it was surely a joyful day. What was more amazing to me, besides the fact that my mother finally bended a little and bought me the eighty-dollar pair of shoes, was how fast the trend had gotten around my neighborhood. It went from only one person owning the shoes, to literally hundreds of kids wearing them in a matter of weeks. I would walk down the halls of my elementary school, down the corridors at my brothers’ high school, down the aisles of the grocery stores, and everywhere I turned I saw those same white, shiny patent-leather shoes. Boy, was that fast!

What has a greater effect over our lives: genetics or environment?  Unfortunately, this is a question with no answer.  The nature versus nurture debate has been continuing since the time of Aristotle, and yet, we are no closer to determining the truth.  Each side has valid points that any sane person is unlikely to dismiss.  Therefore, the debate is unlikely to end soon.  For now we will have to accept that our personalities and tendencies are a combination of genetics and environmental influences. 

The wonders of emotions have baffled scientists since the time of Aristotle.  During the scientific revolution, Robert Burton tried to understand why emotions have such a momentous effect on the human life.  Still today, the mystery of emotions plagues Joseph LeDoux in his quest to understand how and why the brain processes emotions.  In his book, The Emotional Brain, LeDoux unearths evolutionary secrets that explain certain emotions, and he ponders the role of genetics in cognition.  As a scientific reader, this book tackles many serious issues and makes them easy to understand for the layman.

Due to my upbringing on an island isolated in the middle of the South Pacific, I never really got into the mainstream trends of the US. When I came to Bryn Mawr for college, I was astounded by the importance of brand names, and how one’s status could be determined simply by the car they drove, the clothes they wore and even where they went to buy groceries. The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell provides great insight into how social trends take off and what factors are the most likely to influence the public’s behavior. However, from a broader standpoint, the book is about change and understanding what events trigger social change.

          Your professor has just asked you to present a research project in front of a lecture hall filled to the rafters with people. You completed the project weeks ago, and you know the information like the back of your hand. Yet, as soon as you stand in front of the podium, your hands start to shake. Your brow beads with sweat and your heart begins to race. As you attempt your first word, your voice quivers and your throat clenches. You fumble with your notes and you ask yourself ‘Why on earth did I agree to this?’ You wish that you were anywhere but behind that podium and in front of hundreds of eyes, and you blame the common phenomenon of stage fright (1).

Weight loss is always a popular topic of New Year’s resolutions, talk shows and self help guides. However, recently concern has turned toward a more severe form of weigh gain, obesity.  It seems one cannot open a newspaper without reading about it.  In fact, in 2000, Philadelphia was the fattest city in the United States and in 2005 the third fattest city. (1)  Clearly, obesity is a pervasive problem, a disease occurring with alarming frequency.  Being obese, having a body mass index of over 30, (2) is associated with risk factors such as high blood pressure, coronary artery disease, sleep apnea, cancer, diabetes, and death: 300,000 deaths a year in the United States are linked to obesity. (3)  In 1998, the Nation Institute of Health (NIH) found that 55% of the United States population is overweight, and estimated that in 2004 this had climbed to two-thirds of adults in the US.  These statistics have grabbed the attention of both the NIH and the World Health Organization (WHO), which composed a Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity, and Health in 2004. (4)  While many factors and causes are being investigated for this growing problem, the science behind addiction can help us understand this disease.

In Phantoms in the Brain, author V.S. Ramachandran, M.D., PH.D describes a number of case studies of neurological phenomena that demonstrate the human mind’s ability to reconstruct reality.  He explains, among many other phenomena, how amputees may develop phantom limbs so well-defined they can “reach out” and “grab” objects, and how the brain fills in images to compensate for blind spots.  Through explaining these unusual situations, Ramachandran also explains how the brains of most people work, filling in missing information and reconstructing reality.  Though he never uses the terms “I-function” or “story-teller,” these are the equivalent concepts discussed in class.

“Smart, funny, and attractive” are the standard trio of personal ads.  Having a good sense of humor is considered an admirable trait in human society.  But why is this trait so important to us?  It does not appear to have any real advantage, other than making someone “likeable,” so why would it ever evolve?  The most likely explanation is that humor was sexually selected for because it is an indicator of a creative and agile mind able to solve problems and to provide for a mate.

Humor is a form of creativity, because it requires a novel interpretation of information.  Creativity can be considered the ability to rearrange preexisting pieces of information to create a novel idea (1).  Creativity most likely evolved during a very short period of time known as the “creative explosion” of the Upper Paleolithic period due to the merging of several cognitive abilities.  Before this creative explosion, the stone tools used by Early Humans show very little change.  Then suddenly, many different types of tools developed, along with art and other aspects of culture.  This creative explosion most likely coincides with the development of modern language abilities (2).  Steven J. Mithen explains that language is necessary to express creative thoughts, because our minds are not meant to deal with unreality; creative ideas that break the laws of reality must be expressed and communicated in order to be understood.  One of the major differences between animal communication and human language is that language allows people to talk about what does not exist or is not present (3).  Humans can speculate, lie, and tell fantastical stories using creative language.  And they can also tell jokes.  But why do we tell jokes?  Did an Early Human with a witty sense of humor have an evolutionary advantage over a straight-man?  This may not seem likely, but a creative mind would have offered a survival advantage.