"This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness." - The Dalai Lama
"Free your mind and your ass will follow" - George Clinton
The Accidental Blog
Drill, Baby, Drill
We're making a holiday visit to my sister-in-law and her family. They live on top of a mountain so four wheel drive is necessary to get up the road to her place if it snows. I went to Enterprise Car Rental in Boulder, Colorado to pick up the 4WD car I had reserved online. After I filled out the paperwork they proudly showed my my rental: a brand-new Hummer H3.
"Well, there goes my environmentalist credibility."
"Sorry-- it's the only 4WD we have left."
"That's OK-- it'll be in interesting change from the Volkswagen I drive at home"
So, I've been hauling my family around the lefty-green bastion of Boulder in our rent-a-Hummer, getting into the fuel-burning lifestyle. The other day, I…
Pleasure without color or depth
To date, the evidence for a general, neurobiological model of pleasure is compelling and is only growing stronger as more research is done. How, then, should we think about the pleasures that animate our lives? Is that wonderful meal, the night of great sex, that hilarious tipsy night at the bar with your friends all reducible to firing of the ventral tegmental area and dopamine surges? Well, yes and no. Yes, in the sense that there seems to be a neural rheostat of reward that's engaged by almost everything we find pleasurable. No, in the sense that the activity of the pleasure circuit in isolation is a lifeless pleasure, a pleasure without color or depth. What makes pleasure…
Lurve
"The kind of love my mum talks about is full of worry and work and forgiving people and putting up with things and stuff like that. It's not a lot of fun, that's for sure. If that really is love, the kind my mum talks about, then nobody can ever know if they love somebody, can they?"
--Nick Hornby, Slam
A general theory of pleasure and addiction?
Internet addicts, gambling addicts and sex addicts. Chocaholics and shopaholics. Our everyday speech promotes the idea that one can become addicted to any pleasurable activity. Certainly, there’s a thread of truth— these are all compulsive behaviors that can impact people’s lives to varying degrees. But how similar are they at a biological level? Is video game addiction or gambling addiction or food addiction really like drug addiction in terms of life impact or brain function or are these terms just an example of metaphoric language?
Both gambling and video game addictions meet many of the formal behavioral definitions of addiction developed by psychologists, and there are…
(Your Brain on) Drugs and the Memory of Drugs
Not all psychoactive drugs are addictive and not all people exposed to addictive drugs will become addicts. While some drugs have a very high potential for addiction, not even the most dangerous substances typically produce addiction in a single dose—repeated exposure is required. Addiction can be defined as persistent, compulsive drug use, but addiction doesn’t develop all at once. Rather, it proceeds in stages. When a drug-user initially gets high on cocaine or heroin or amphetamines or PCP, the experience produces an intense euphoric pleasure and sense of well-being. However, repeated doses, particularly if strung closely together in a binge, will begin to trigger the dark side of…
Obesity, Food Addiction & Blunted Pleasure
Are pleasure circuits really activated in natural behaviors? When a recording electrode is implanted in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), a key region in the pleasure circuit of a rat, this reveals a burst of neuronal activity when the rat begins to eat. Furthermore, when biochemical probes that can measure dopamine levels are implanted into the target regions of VTA neurons, eating is found to trigger a surge of released dopamine. Interestingly, VTA activity and dopamine release were most strongly stimulated by consumption of sweet and highly caloric foods. When drugs that flood the brain with dopamine, like cocaine or amphetamine, are given chronically, rats eat less and consequently…
The worms play pinochle on your snout
Clearly, the pleasure circuits of the brain have not evolved just to be activated by implanted electrodes. Pleasure is central to survival. We must experience basic behaviors such as feeding, drinking, mating and care of offspring as pleasurable (rewarding) in order to survive and pass along our genes to the next generation. Of course, this consideration is not unique to humans. Indeed, rudimentary pleasure pathways appear quite early in evolutionary history. Even the roundworm C. elegans, which is a millimeter long and has only 302 neurons in its entire body has some basic pleasure circuitry. These worms typically feed on soil bacteria and they are very good at following odor cues to…
Julia at the Med
I last lived in Berkeley in 1984, my senior year of college. One day that Spring, I was sitting in the Cafe Mediterraneum on Telegraph Avenue, when the well-known street poet Julia Vinograd walked up hawking her books. I was fresh out of cash at that point, having blown my last buck on a cup of oolong. But I did have a stack of photos of various tissues taken with the electron microscope that very morning. So we swapped-- one book of poetry for one electron micrograph of cardiac muscle.
Last week, I was back in Berkeley to give a seminar and I wandered into the Med, feeling nostalgic. Who was still there peddling her poetry, 24 years later? Julia Vinograd of course. Her newest…
I'll have the Primordial Soup
"Cooks were not supposed to be political. Cooks were the mitochondria of humanity; they had their own separate DNA, they floated in a cell and powered it but were not really of it."
--Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections
Orgasmatron?
I know what you’re thinking: what does it feel like for a human to have his or her medial forebrain reward circuitry stimulated with an electrode? Does it produce a crazy pleasure that’s better than food or sex or sleep or even “Seinfeld” reruns? We know the answer. However, the bad news is that it comes, in part, from some deeply unethical experiments. Dr. Robert Galbraith Heath was the founder and Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Neurology at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. He served from 1949 to 1980 and during that time, one major focus of his work involved stimulation of the brains of institutionalized psychiatric patients, often African Americans, using…
A Perfectly Nice Monogamous Relationship With This Ravioli
I was in L.A. last week and was lucky to have dinner with my old hometown pal Attila Giri. She writes a witty and spirited account of our meal and conversation that's way more interesting than anything I could scribble.
Ancient Synaptic History
Oslo, 1964. A malaise had settled over the community of neurobiologists investigating the biological substrates of memory. Obviously, memories can last for the lifetime of an animal. Thus it was expected that experience should produce long-lasting changes in neuronal function to underlie the memory trace. The best guess for the aspect of neuronal function changed by experience was synaptic transmission. Synaptic transmission is the fundamental mode of rapid communication between neurons and so is central to information processing in the brain. The dominant hypothesis was that particular patterns of neuronal stimulation delivered to neurons with electrodes (thereby mimicking actual…
Every Dog Will Have His Day
Not Photoshopped! This is the real current issue of the esteemed scientific journal Nature. Layout artists have all the fun.
Aw c'mon honey-- it's ragweed season!
From the journal Medical Hypotheses, comes the ground breaking new article: "Ejaculation as a potential treatment of nasal congestion in mature males" by Sina Zarrintan of Tabriz Medical University, Iran.
"As it is seen, ejaculation can be used as a potential treatment of nasal congestion because its emission phase provides a sympathetic stimulation and subsequent vasoconstriction and nasal decongestion. Also, the refractory period serves as a sympathetic reservoir and maintains the decongestive state for a considerable while. This method does not wish to have the adverse effects of pharmaceutical decongestants because it is a physiologic stimulation of the sympathetic system in the body.…
The discovery of brain pleasure circuits
Montréal, 1954.
Fortunately, Peter Milner and James Olds didn’t have perfect aim with their electrodes. While postdoctoral fellows at McGill University under the direction of the renowned psychologist Donald Hebb, Olds and Milner were conducting experiments which involved implanting electrodes deep into the brains of rats. The implanting surgery was done under anesthesia and the electrodes, two of them, half a millimeter apart, were then cemented to the skull. After a few days to recover from the surgery, the rats were fine. Long, flexible wires were attached to the electrodes at one end and to a electrical stimulator at the other, to allow for discrete activation of the specific brain…
Thoughts on medial forebrain dopaminergic reward circuits
"For the bow cannot stand always bent, nor can human nature or human frailty subsist without some lawful recreation."
- Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
"Pleasure never comes sincere to man; but lent by heaven upon hard usury."
- John Dryden (Edippus, Act 1, Scene 1)
Bangkok, 1989
The afternoon rains have ended leaving the air briefly free of smog and allowing that distinctive Thai perfume, frangipani with a faint note of sewage, to waft over the shiny streets. It’s the early evening. I hail a tuk-tuk, a 3-wheel motorcycle taxi, and hop aboard. My young driver has an entrepreneurial smile as his turns around.
“So….you want girl?”
“No.”
“I see.”
Long pause, eyebrows slowly raised. “You want boy!”
“Uh, no.”
Longer pause. Sound of engine sputtering at idle. “You want ladyboy?”
“No.”
“I got cheap cigarettes…Johnnie Walker...”
“No thanks.”
Voice lowered. “You want ganja?”
“No.”
“Coke?”
“No”
“Ya baa(methamphetamine tablets)?”
“Nope.”
A whisper now. “Heroin?”
“No.”
Voice raised…
Brash and Breezy
Noted psychiatrist Lawrence Hartmann, M.D., writes the following in his review of The Accidental Mind in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
"This thoughtful neuroscientist’s book about brain evolution, structure, and function, which places refreshing emphasis on some relatively messy and ad hoc qualities of brain evolution and on the inefficiencies of brain design and function, seems to me significantly flawed by its frequently brash and breezy style. For example, the last words of the introduction are “let’s roll.” The author is fond of words such as “downer” and “cool.”
So true, dude.
Yakkity-Yak
For those of you who just can't get enough of me running my mouth on the topic of brain evolution, here's a podcast from the American Physiological Society aka The Home Team. It's episode 12 of the "Life Lines" series and it also features kewl nooz on athletic blood doping and fetal alcohol syndrome.
Ford Fiesta of the Mind
Phil Hogan, writing in The Observer (UK), says he's made it up to Chapter 5 in The Accidental Mind and offers this useful summary of the book so far...
"Now, where was I? Ah, the book, The Accidental Mind by David J Linden. It's brilliant, I'm sure, though the more I read the less I know. I gather from his general thesis that brains are not as brilliantly engineered as we like to think. We might have a hundred billion cells going at it round the clock but they're constantly misfiring or getting the wrong end of the stick. Brains are more Heath Robinson than Bill Gates, having evolved over the aeons simply by growing new pipes and cables on top of the crappy old ones.
And while ordinary…
Monkey See
So, I wrote a "welcome editorial" to mark the beginning of my term as Editor in Chief for the Journal of Neurophysiology. In it, I briefly laid out a few points-- what I liked about JN and what I thought could be productively changed. I also preached a bit about author and referee behavior. I didn't think that any of the ideas therein were particularly provocative-- they echo the sentiments that I hear from my colleagues every day at lunchtime. Nonetheless, the editorial seems to have sparked some interesting and productive debate and commentary at the science blogs DrugMonkey and The Junction Potential.
.In Germany, before the wars
Some relative of mine pressed these flowers in a photo envelope in Frankfurt, sometime around 1905. I wish I knew the story behind them.
Dang
Apparently, The Accidental Mind has won the Silver Medal in the "Science" category at the 2008 Independent Publisher Book Awards. I didn't even know I was entered and only learned about the award through the dubious practice of self-googling (which is prohibited in many of the world's religious traditions).
"By the facial hair of my ancestors..."
It sounds like the beginning of an elaborate curse, doesn't it? I recently uncovered a huge stash of old family photos, which I'm just starting to examine. I dig the tonsorial splendor of these fine fellows, circa 1900.
Decapitation Averted (For Now)
On Monday, I unlocked the door to my office and found the place totally trashed. My scanner was smashed to bits, books were strewn everywhere, my desk and chair were crushed. My first thought was, "Damn. Those creationists who've been sending me all the death threats since The Accidental Mind was published managed to get in here." Then, I realized that all the mayhem resulted from a single action- the huge wall-mounted cabinets full of books had broken loose and had come crashing down (one would have neatly bisected my cranium, had I been sitting at my desk.) Examination of the cabinets revealed that, back in 2002, the contractors had failed to secure the cabinets to the studs, relying…
Neuroscientists Talk Shop
...is the name of a new podcast series from The University of Texas at San Antonio. These are roundtable discussions with UTSA Neurobiology faculty and a different guest each week. Recent guests include Linda Overstreet-Wadiche, Mario Capecchi, John Lisman and yours truly. These podcasts are intended for an audience of neuroscientists and so they get into the nitty-gritty fairly quickly.
A Kludge By Any Other Name
From the promotional material for Gary Marcus' new book Kluge:
"Are we noble in reason? Perfect, in God's image? Far from it, says New York University psychologist Gary Marcus. In this lucid and revealing book, Marcus argues that the mind is not an elegantly designed organ but rather a "kluge," a clumsy, cobbled-together contraption. He unveils a fundamentally new way of looking at the human mind -- think duct tape, not supercomputer -- that sheds light on some of the most mysterious aspects of human nature."
Damn, that's clever. I wish I had thought of that. From Chapter 1 of The Accidental Mind:
"It is the widely assumed that since the mind is in the brain, and this is a great…
Neuropharmacology In The Real World
"Phil was probably passed out somewhere, enjoying his dead father's legacy. I found myself wishing I had a loved one who would die and leave me their barbiturates, but I couldn't think of anyone who'd ever loved me that much. My uncle had already promised his to the mail lady."
Donald Ray Pollock, "Bactine"
from his superb collection of stories, Knockemstiff
I love cranky writers
"Closure is a greasy little word which, moreover, describes a nonexistent condition. The truth, Venus, is that nobody ever gets over anything."
--Martin Amis, House of Meetings
Chuck Close Tells It Like It Is
"I don't deal with inspiration. Inspiration is for amateurs. I just get to work."
DIY Brain Surgery
The Times of London reports that British neurosurgeon Henry Marsh has been visiting Kiev in the Ukraine, twice a year, in order to assist and train a Ukrainian colleague. In London, Marsh would use an expensive (30,000 pound) specialized medical drill to create holes on the skull. But, due to lack of funds in Kiev, he and his colleague have made do with a handheld Bosch drill favored by home hobbyists. Cost: 30 pounds. If this cheapskate solution becomes known in the USA, I'm afraid that the insurance companies will reimburse for nothing else.
A Good Yarn
Yesterday, I spoke at a conference entitled "Law of the Body: Implications of Medical Science on Legal Decision Making" at Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Oregon. One of the other speakers was Bill Harbaugh, an economist and neuroscientist from the University of Oregon. In addition to doing cool experiments in which he and his colleagues image the brains of women in the process of paying taxes and making charitable donations, he is also the curator of the online "Museum of Scientifically Accurate Fabric Brain Art" which features this lovely dissection by Karen Norberg.
Intelligent Design Goes to the Movies
My old pal Attila Girl is a fan of the upcoming film from Ben Stein entitled "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" which was recently screend at the Conservative Political Action Committee meeting in Washington D.C. I haven't seen the film, but a longish preview is available online. It purports to tell the story of how academics at American universities are suppressing discussion of Intelligent design creationism, which they claim to be a legitimate scientific theory.
Now, I don't rant that much, but every once in a while, one is called for. So here it goes.
Hostility to evolutionary biology has been a feature of certain parts of the American political and religious landscape for many…