A Woman without a Cerebellum

I just read an article about a woman found to be missing her cerebellum. Surprisingly, this was not discovered until she was 24 years old, already a significant age for a person growing up without a cerebellum. As the cerebellum controls voluntary movements and balance, it is also involved in many other functions such as speech and motor skills. In this case, the woman had problems walking steadily and had difficulties when she was young. However, other parts of the brain took some responsibility for the role of the cerebellum, allowing this woman to grow up fairly normally.
If a person's medulla oblongata was missing or severely damaged, involuntary actions would be severely limited. The medulla oblongata controls autonomic functions, relays nerve signals between the brain and spinal cord, and helps coordinate body movements. It may be possible for a person to survive but their capabilities will be very limited as the medulla oblongata is even involved in heart beat. However, like how other parts of the brain took over some of the cerebellum's roles, the same could happen with the medulla oblongata. Most likely though, the person would not be able to function for very long without medical help.

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Nervous System Power Hour Reading

Why everyone (else) is a hypocrite: evolution and the modular mind
By Robert Kurzban
Consistently Inconsistent
In this book, Kurzban aims to convince the reader that the brain is made up of "modules" which are different parts of the brain that as a whole, shape human behavior. He argues that the human mind is made up of many different mental processes that do not always align. For example, split brain patients. In an experiment by two neuroscientists, they showed that one hemisphere could see something that the other hemisphere couldn't. A simpler example Kurzban used is the phantom arm example where people with amputated arms and legs say that they can still feel those missing limbs. Kurzban argues that this is because some of the nervous system truly believes that the limb is still there. Another one of Kurzvan's arguments is that people should not believe everything that comes out of a person's mouth because the "talking portion" of the brain is not connected to everything else. In other words, the "talking portion" does not accurately portray what the rest of the modules believe; this is the reason for apparent contradictions, why everyone else is a hypocrite and you're not. kurzban's entire book rests on his argument that there are different modules which is why we have inconsistencies, specifically moral hypocrisy.
Kurzban's introduction began with the argument that "Being ignorant, wrong, irrational, and hypocritical can make you much better off than being knowledgable, correct, reasonable, and consisten. As long as you're ignorant, wrong, irrational, and hypocritical in the right ways." In later chapters he discusses how knowing more information can just be disadvantageous, especially to a person's moral compass but that does not make his previous claim any more believable or credible  That is, unless a person wants to stay ignorant, wrong, irrational, and hypocritical. However through his examples, I can see how a person's brain has different modules that either work together or separately.
On a side note, his "wit" and "sometimes hilarious" personality, is not obvious in this book.

20 Time Blog #3: Shifting Directions?

I have been trying to research more about color, but I find that my research has taken me in a direction I did not plan for- subconscious cues. My original topic came about through an article with underlying information on subconscious cues as well but at the time I chose the color aspect. However, now I am finding increased interest in these "cues" as well as that my experimentation takes time and money, both of which are not easily available to me right now. Like we said in class, I think I went for a too ambitious experiment. Much of the information I have come across is backed up by research and experiments which have hundreds of people behind them, showing me just how many resources I would require. However much of what I have studied will be useful as well. Therefore, I am thinking, but not sure yet, of turning my 20 Time project in a different direction, one that I hope will be able to more significantly impact other people. (Advice on this would be much appreciated!)

Unit 7 Reflection

In this unit we learned about directional terms and joint movements, muscle fibers, performance enhancers, and of course, the muscular system! Projects that we did interspersed between lectures really helped bring together and highlight the ways our body works together (such as in our Muscle Contraction Skit Video). This skit depicted the specific steps of contraction in an easy and thorough way since we were able to apply what we learned and not just read it off a piece paper. In addition, the dissection of a chicken that we did helped solidify my understanding and knowledge of the muscles and how they work with tendons and bones to move (Chicken Dissection). I would like to learn more about different muscle diseases and how they affect the person with that disease and the muscles themselves. Learning about the Performance Enhancers touched on that subject but I would like to go a bit more in depth with natural consequences as well.  In regards to my New Years' resolutions, the anabolic steroids 'ad' let me research more about it, as did the chicken dissection. I would say that I am following it sometimes but since it takes more time for me because I like going into more depth, I would like to modify my resolutions to be at least once a unit.

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Performance Enhancement Advertisement: Anabolic Steroids

Performance enhancements can range from amino acids to hormone stimulants but all can hold potential danger for the users. People take anabolic steroids or performance-enhancing substances to boost athletic performance, build muscle, increase body mass, or lose body fat but many of these substances are not regulated and illegal, especially when used in athletic competitions. Some health risks include severe acne, stunted growth, high blood pressure, strokes, and even liver cancer. Some stimulants are seemingly harmless such as caffeine or protein diets, but others such as anabolic steroid, androstenedione, and gene doping have extreme risks.

Chicken Dissection Lab Analysis

In this lab, I dissected a chicken (pre-plucked, with no head or feet) to become more familiar with the different muscles and how movements correspond with muscles. For example, we would pull on the wing to see different muscles move as those would be the muscles that normally contract to cause that action such as pulling the wing up to exercise the pectoralis major which is responsible for flight in birds. In addition, the biceps brachii works to bend the wing in chickens, and is connected to the humerus. The origin is proximal to the body; for example, with the latissimus dorsi, it is attached to the arm. The insertion is where the muscle is attached to the bone or tendon and is distal to the body. In chicken muscles, the pectoralis major are much larger than those of humans since chickens must use those breast muscles to fly. Another comparison between chicken muscles and human muscles can be seen in their function such as with the triceps humeralis where in chickens it straightens the wing and in humans it is used for reverse curls. The flexor carpi ulnaris is a connected to a chicken's thumb and flexes it while in humans, the hand can be flexed using all five fingers.

The pectoralis major is the breast muscle of the bird and pulls the wing up, powering flight in chickens.

The pectoralis minor lifts the wing dorsally and pulls the shoulder down and forward.

The trapezius helps to shrug the shoulders, running perpendicular from the backbone to the shoulder.

The latissimus dorsus runs from the spine into the arm pit/wing, extending the wing/arm.

The deltoid raises the upper arm/wing and is on the center top of the shoulder. 

The triceps humeralis straightens the wing/arm. The biceps brachii flexes/bends the wing/arm.

The brachioradialis pulls the hand back and the flexor carpi ulnaris flexes the hand.

The gastrocnemius is attached to the achilles tendon and extends the foot and flexes the lower leg. The Peroneus longus extends the foot. The tibialis anterior flexes the foot.

The sartorius flexes the thigh and allows crossing of the legs. The iliotibialis or tensor fasciae latae, gluteus maximus and iliotibial tract extends the thigh and flexes the leg.

The biceps femoris flexes the leg and helps make up the hamstring group. The quadriceps femoris or vastus lateralis, intermedius and medialis and rectus femoris flexes the thigh and extends the lower leg. This is also known as the quadricep.

The semimembranousus extends the thigh and the semitendinosus extends the thigh as well but is anterior and medial to the semimembranosus.

20 Time Blog #2: More Research...

When doing research about emotions or human reactions, it often begins with figuring out what portion of the brain this reaction occurs in. I've found that since the hippocampus deals with long term memory, a person's subconscious reaction to color is most likely due to what a person can recall in his or her memory about what experiences or events were connected with that color. However, Mr.Orre gave a comment on my previous post about looking into blind and double blind studies. I knew I already wanted to use the likert scale for the questionnaire but the double blind study seems to fit well as well. Although it seems like it would be useful for making my results more accurate, I am struggling with finding a way with having the participant and the experimenter not know who belongs to the test group and who belongs to the control group. I could try having both wear colored shirts but the colored shirts and the questions would give away the subject of the experiment. 

In the meantime, I have come up with a few set questions and am preparing more in varying degrees of subtlety to ask if I want to incorporate the double blind experiment as well. In addition, there are already assumptions about different colors and what emotions or reactions they can result in. However through this experiment I would like to expand it to refer to clothing and since much of this is assumption and not based on evidence (because this is extremely difficult to accurately study I'm finding), I aim to find more solid proof.