The stuff at the very center of our heads is crazy cool and primitive. The emotional and physiological basis for fear common to all animals originates there. I did a post about these little small components of our brains called amygdalae. Studies show that if your pair are just 15% different in size you will have PROFOUND mental challenges. They are about the size of an almond. They continue to develop perhaps till our early teens in response to stimulus. What should I be afraid of???
If you don't have them at all (due to mutation or disease) you will HAVE NO FEAR or threat response at all and be the ultimate risk-taker! It is thought the amygdalae are problematic in serial killers for example as they have no innate moderation. Weird but fascinating. Here's a link if you are interested. https://markdolan.substack.com/almonds-are-small -- this was back in the day when NO ONE knew this Newsletter existed and that was how I wanted it :)
Thanks for reading & commenting -- I wonder if there is someone whose job it is to make the cabbage look good in a photograph. Maybe it is all in the lighting :) Mark it as the day you became a Venusian and I became a Martian. When I read that I thought it pretty cool and not unlike when someone throws in too much hot sauce and ruins a recipe.
Brains are complicated. In addition to estrogen and testosterone related differences, there are all the other neurochemical differences that can make up a "sane" brain versus a "disordered" brain. As someone with a differently wired brain, I'm of the opinion that some disordered brains may just be outdated brains. One of my doctors once explained to me that ADHD was not only most likely normal in the past, but probably essential for survival. Not so much nowadays, when lacking the ability to filter out distractions can be a major handicap (and a major annoyance to innocent bystanders! 😁). Very interesting post, thank you!
THANKS! I believe the most important part of a Substack post is the comments. It is where the thesis gets evaluated and improved. This is awesome and worth thinking about! Thinking of ADHD as normal in past is a very cool perspective. You also, if we were on Reddit, would get an upvote and a medal!
In my personal experience with ADHD, I've found that I have great difficulty with filtering - exhibited by my tendency for unfiltered, ultimately embarrassing verbal blurts and my inability to ignore stuff that's going on around me that has nothing to do with me... it's probably why I prefer life in the sticks, I can actually concentrate on what I need to get done. But my doc said that the ability to notice everything that's going on around me would have been a great survival skill back in the good 'ol days. Though now, this ability often makes it difficult to navigate an over-crowded world (and occasionally causes me to interrupt a stranger talking on a cellphone because I think they're talking to me!). If I'm hiking in the woods, though, it's a very useful gift (no bears are gonna sneak up on ME! 😁).
It seems HIGHLY UNLIKELY we were meant to be so close together and on top of each other -- while people "adapt" we probably have the same basic primary senses attached to the same regions of our primitive brain and as a result are just over-stimulated in a lot of ways. Being highly sensory perceptive would have been a great quality back in the day. I am fascinated by even the impact of light at the wrong time of our days. Its hard for folks to realize we only conquered the night broadly in the last 200 years or so...I'm not sure I ever posted about it but at one point, sections of Britain were capturing oily birds and putting them on a stake at the table just to get about an hour of smoky smelly light and that was only 250 years ago. I find that people who are attentive to turniing off their lights and devices have much healthier sleep patterns.
Thought provoking as always!
Thank you for reading n commenting!
Such a beautiful cabbage! And so strange that our brains are identical until we add one of those hormones.
Agreed, this is really interesting, I didn't know the brain builds from the inside out!
Thanks for reading and commenting!
The stuff at the very center of our heads is crazy cool and primitive. The emotional and physiological basis for fear common to all animals originates there. I did a post about these little small components of our brains called amygdalae. Studies show that if your pair are just 15% different in size you will have PROFOUND mental challenges. They are about the size of an almond. They continue to develop perhaps till our early teens in response to stimulus. What should I be afraid of???
If you don't have them at all (due to mutation or disease) you will HAVE NO FEAR or threat response at all and be the ultimate risk-taker! It is thought the amygdalae are problematic in serial killers for example as they have no innate moderation. Weird but fascinating. Here's a link if you are interested. https://markdolan.substack.com/almonds-are-small -- this was back in the day when NO ONE knew this Newsletter existed and that was how I wanted it :)
Thanks for reading & commenting -- I wonder if there is someone whose job it is to make the cabbage look good in a photograph. Maybe it is all in the lighting :) Mark it as the day you became a Venusian and I became a Martian. When I read that I thought it pretty cool and not unlike when someone throws in too much hot sauce and ruins a recipe.
Brains are complicated. In addition to estrogen and testosterone related differences, there are all the other neurochemical differences that can make up a "sane" brain versus a "disordered" brain. As someone with a differently wired brain, I'm of the opinion that some disordered brains may just be outdated brains. One of my doctors once explained to me that ADHD was not only most likely normal in the past, but probably essential for survival. Not so much nowadays, when lacking the ability to filter out distractions can be a major handicap (and a major annoyance to innocent bystanders! 😁). Very interesting post, thank you!
THANKS! I believe the most important part of a Substack post is the comments. It is where the thesis gets evaluated and improved. This is awesome and worth thinking about! Thinking of ADHD as normal in past is a very cool perspective. You also, if we were on Reddit, would get an upvote and a medal!
In my personal experience with ADHD, I've found that I have great difficulty with filtering - exhibited by my tendency for unfiltered, ultimately embarrassing verbal blurts and my inability to ignore stuff that's going on around me that has nothing to do with me... it's probably why I prefer life in the sticks, I can actually concentrate on what I need to get done. But my doc said that the ability to notice everything that's going on around me would have been a great survival skill back in the good 'ol days. Though now, this ability often makes it difficult to navigate an over-crowded world (and occasionally causes me to interrupt a stranger talking on a cellphone because I think they're talking to me!). If I'm hiking in the woods, though, it's a very useful gift (no bears are gonna sneak up on ME! 😁).
It seems HIGHLY UNLIKELY we were meant to be so close together and on top of each other -- while people "adapt" we probably have the same basic primary senses attached to the same regions of our primitive brain and as a result are just over-stimulated in a lot of ways. Being highly sensory perceptive would have been a great quality back in the day. I am fascinated by even the impact of light at the wrong time of our days. Its hard for folks to realize we only conquered the night broadly in the last 200 years or so...I'm not sure I ever posted about it but at one point, sections of Britain were capturing oily birds and putting them on a stake at the table just to get about an hour of smoky smelly light and that was only 250 years ago. I find that people who are attentive to turniing off their lights and devices have much healthier sleep patterns.
Gee, thank you! But I'll settle for a simple "like" and a reply here on Substack. 😊
As a social media abstainer, I find this a much healthier platform. It helps the profile seems to be people who like to read!!!