An article in the Feb 2018 issue of "JAMA Neurology" celebrates the 200th bicenntennial of Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" whose neuroscience relevance is the implication of "Two Brains", that is, "normal brains" and "Abby normal Brain (tm, Mel Brooks)". See:
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaneurology/article-abstract/2666191?redirect=true Whatis interesting is that the novel does not contain this implication at all,rather, there are bioethical issues about the research and its justification (would it pass a current day IRB? See: Harrison G, Gannon WL. Victor Frankenstein’s Institutional Review Board Proposal, 1790. Sci Eng Ethics. 2015;21(5):1139-1157. ). The issue of two brains with one containing structures and processes that lead to criminal behavior is actually developed in the movies (just another example of why movies are a terrible source of information about psychology, especially scientific research and results; from the movies I assume all clinical psychologist sleep with their patients ;-). The following quote provides the common view of what Shelley was saying in the novel: |Scholars have agreed that Mary Shelley was concerned about |the unbridled pursuit of knowledge, fame, and power destroying |the moral fabric of the scientist.10 She wrote that in seeing his |Creature, a shocked Victor Frankenstein asked himself, “What |have I created?”1 Neurologists (and Tinseltown) today may ask |a similar question. It seems like this article would be appropriate for a variety of courses, from intro psychology (e.g., movies provide incorrect information about scientific psychology), cognitive neuroscience (e.g., the overreach of neuroscience in trying to explain behavior and cognition at the expense of social and cultural factors which may lead to criminal behavior instead of brain structures as the causal factors), and psychology and media (e.g., when scientific psychology research is presented in movies tell your students to locate the published research articles the serves as the basis for the claims made about behavior [note secondary sources like textbooks, pop sci articles and books, etc.]). On the latter point, the general public's lack of familiarity with scientific issues, scientific psychology, and critical textual analysis of literature and its various forms (which includes movies; how many people who teach a Psychology and Media course include texts on literary text analysis?). Then again, if the psych and media course is only supposed to be a student magnet where the main point is just watching movies for fun and not for distinguishing facts from fiction (anyone point out that the Star Wars movies have great sound effects in outer space which makes for exciting action scenes but, of course, since outer space cannot transmit sound [use "2001" for comparison], all the action scenes would be silent except for background music -- show action science with the sound on and off and ask what reactions students have to the two modes of presentation). then don't bother with articles like this or other articles that show how movies misrepresent science. A course like that would not be any fun at all. ;-) Sidenote: anyone notice how the movie "Kingsman: The Secret Service" snuck in neurolinguist programming as part of the agent training? The three agents who use the techniques in trying to seduce a person in a club act as though they are effective techniques in making a person comply with the speaker's conversation goals (in this case, having sex with the person). A good assignment for this scene is to ask students to find the peer-review literature that support these techniques (good luck on that). -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=52106 or send a blank email to leave-52106-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
