Hello All. Someone suggested I describe my affiliations etc. Of course, you can Google me and find my entire Vita. I am an Associate Professor at Drexel University. I asked interested people to review and comment on some stats modeling programs I developed for my undergrad stats courses. I am especially interested to know if stats instructors on the list might find these helpful.
Here is the link: http://www.learnpsychology.com/courses/statcourse/programs.htm There was also a message on the list referring to cranial trephination. I worked with one of the authors, John Verano, many years ago on the trephination project that he is continuing. John has examined many more skulls than the ones mentioned in the news release. Roughy one-half of all the great trephination cases are in museums in the US. You can usually see a nice display of skulls at the Peabody Museum, the Smithsonian, San Diego Museum of Man and the Mutter in Philadelphia (The Mutter skulls are high-quality casts). John has focused on the many undocumented skulls that are still in Peru. As a neuropsychologist studying trauma brain injury, my focus was whether the Peruvians developed any ideas of brain anatomy, neurological illness or brain function from conducting so many trephinations. Unfortunately, most trephined skulls were not collected on site by anthropologists. Most are dissassociated skulls without other remains. In most cases, only a general idea of place and time are known. Although I owe a great debt to John for teaching me the basics of physical anthropology, I really could not test any of my hypotheses. I now know how to gender and age a skull. I still want to explore a hypothesis that tooth wear can reveal handedness. It is very clear that the Peruvians used trephination to treat traumatic head injury. The Peruvians fought with clubs and sling stones. Presumably after a battle there was a field of people lying about moaning with head injuries, all in varous states of coma and stupor. It is obvious from the large number of trephined skulls discovered thus far that a clinical practice of trephination developed to treat these people. Most trephinations are associated with healing. People lived for years after the injury. I recall the skull of one old warrior who had two healed trephinations and a third unhealed one. The left side of his face was a beaten mass of broken and healed bone. We could barely tell that an eye socket had once been on that side of his face. However, his face was a well-healed mass. Presumably he fought in previous battles, was beaten severly and treated with trephination. His face bones were probably also treated with scraping and cutting. He then entered his last battle and was treated with a trephination that did not heal because he died from his injuries. Many trephinations are associated with clear linear and depressed skull fractures. There is a beautiful skull in the Peabody museum in which a depressed fracture the size of a half-dollar is surrounded by an incomplete straight-cutting trephination. Since the cuts are unhealed, the patient likely died before the trephination was completed and the trephiner discontinued his work. There is another rare skull in the Peabody in which the mummified brain and dura are still in place. They can be viewed through the trephined opening. The Inca represent the most recent Peruvian group and they integrated knowledge and crafts from all over their empire. Of the roughly three trephination methods (drilling, straight-cutting and scraping), they appeared to standardize on the scraping method. Older Peruvian cultures tended to use the other methods. Scraping is the faster, safer method. The two things I appreciate most from these studies is modern anethesia and modern dentistry. Every time I go to the dentist now, I think about how bad it could be without metal tools and Novacaine. Here is a link to a section of my neuropsych course that includes some nice images of trephined skulls: http://braincampus.learnpsychology.com/intro.html Finally, one of most interesting aspects of our studies was when a documentary film crew was doing a film on modern, self-inflicted trephinations. There was apparently a time in the 1960s when the counter-culture advocated trephination as a mind-expanding procedure. The Beatles even considered getting them. A number of people actually produced their own trephinations. If you need a great video as a discussion prompt for intro psychology or health psychology, check out A Hole In The Head: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0202909/ Mike Williams > > http://scienceblogs.com/neurophilosophy/2008/05/prehistoric_peruvian_trepanati.php > ************** Wondering what's for Dinner Tonight? Get new twists on family favorites at AOL Food. (http://food.aol.com/dinner-tonight?NCID=aolfod00030000000001) --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
