Impolite Society: Exploring the Weird, Taboo & Macabre

Traumatic Brain Injuries: When Good Brains Go Bad

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In this episode of Impolite Society, Lara and Rachel delve into the complexities and mysteries of the human brain. Starting with traumatic brain injuries, they explore how incidents like Phineas Gage's railroad accident reveal the brain's impact on personality and behavior. 

From there we unpack various brain anomalies, including hemispatial neglect, blindsight, and cases like Henry Molaison’s that offer a fascinating look at how brain injuries can radically alter one's experience of reality. 

Perfect for curious minds, we're combining humor and research into a wormhole of an episode about the most complicated organ in the human body.

Got your own thoughts? Text them to Impolite Society!

Text Rachel and Laura or email us at rude@impolitesocietypodcast.com. Visit our website for info about the show and your hosts.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

The human brain is a complex network of billions of neurons, each interconnected, each vital, but this extraordinary organ can be quite delicate and your whole world could change in an instant. Traumatic brain injuries can steal away cognitive functions, motor skills, and even our very sense of self. That squishy gray matter that keeps us alive, conscious, and occasionally insane is a complicated network that works together in ways we have only begun to understand. Today, we're noodling on our noodles and exploring the many ways it can all go terribly wrong and amazingly right. That's what you're in for today on Impolite Society. welcome back to Impolite Society. I am Lara.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And I'm Rachel.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Did you know, Rachel, that you have an extraordinary machine on you right now?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Uh, I think the Extraordinary Machine was actually my nickname in college.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Ooh, like a sex machine?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Natty Lights machine. or the other.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

But no, it's not a sex machine. It's not a Natty Light machine, and it's not even your phone. You know, that seems to be welded into everyone's person nowadays. Pinging you until you lose your fucking mind with all the blings, the bops, the boops. I hate phones. And, I'm really over technology right now. Anyway, no, it is your brain that I'm talking about, and it is one crazy little piece of engineering. So I want to let you know what sparked this episode. And this was a story that I had heard way back in college psych class. Was about a man who had this really horrific accident and kind of what happened to him afterwards. And I thought, okay, I bet there's enough people out there to make a gross and Pretty easy episode about damage to the brain.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

you know, how many different brain splatters, right? That was the original thought, just different brain splatters.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

but as I got to researching and looking at these stories, I found myself less and less interested in that gore factor and more and more into these thinkers that we got up there because they are just amazing and they're

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

If you think about it too hard though, it makes your head hurt.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Truly, truly. And, and, but it's also a little terrifying, right? Is your whole self is in there in your skull wobbling around in some cerebro spinal fluid, just one blow away from total devastation.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And what's even more terrifying is that everyone you love, what makes them them, is in the same situation teetering on the knife's edge, man.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Especially when they're little

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Oh God. And they're soft, soft skulls.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

the shell isn't even fully there yet. And they want to die so badly. They try so

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

it is the human condition, man. It's a, it's a rough ride to be on. So instead of a gross out episode about the horrible and gory brain injuries that we can do, this is, this is more of an admiration episode about just the brain is crazy and the human brain can go haywire in so many ways. I mean.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I think that's evident by many of our topics.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. Yeah. And, and I also call back to the technology and social media that I reference because I feel like we are just all losing our goddamn minds lately.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I don't know. I think I am, uh, the most sane I've ever been, so

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Well, kudos to you because you might be the only one.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

That's just called delusion, right?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

But there are more tactile ways for everything upstairs to go horribly, horribly wrong. And some very creative ways that you and your brain manages to, uh, emerge on the other side. And,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

condition, man, right? We emerge on the other side. I didn't even get into all that Donner's party talk on the, uh, on the little chit chat we had. Thank you. I mean, they killed a bear! Just a bunch of starving people out in the western frontier in the middle of winter killed a grizzly bear. How? I don't know. Humans, we find a way.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

We endure. It's what we do. We find a way. That's a, that's what Ian Malcolm's quote should have been. Not life finds a way. Humans, we find a way. And, in this research, I kind of stumbled upon a little subculture of people on the internet, which was victims of TBI's traumatic brain injuries, and a traumatic brain injury is what it's called. I think it's kind of self explanatory, but when external forces like a blow to the head, someone bashing you with a heavy object, whatever it is, causes severe damage to your brain. And even if somebody has recovered from their brain injury with extensive therapy, like speech therapy, physical therapy, any kind of therapy you can think of to get your body working again, they could be functioning, but at the same time living with terrible side effects like acute memory loss, severe headaches, emotional regulation issues, behavioral issues, all kinds of really terrible life altering shit.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Uh, does rampant TikTok use count as a TBI? Because I feel like I have all those same symptoms.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No, definitely not the same because, I mean, these people, they're really suffering and it's sad. They're,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

not to make light of them.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

yeah, they're, there are all these things that modern

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

have behavior issues, for sure.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

all these things that modern medicine and doctors can't really help them with, these doctors. They can do therapies, but when it comes to how the brain functions and how it regulates themselves, there's not much that they can do. They can offer them antidepressants, you know, talk therapy, coping mechanisms, but on the whole, it's this thing of either your brain is going to get better over time or it won't. And there isn't a good way to say which it's going to be. Or when it's going to be. And that mystery of what the brain does and on what timeline that it does it is how we get people waking up from comas for after 20 years or come some crazy shit like that. It's just, no one knows. It's a mystery up there in the old noggin and there's people that are suffering.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Well, I kind of like that, though. Not the suffering, but that it's a mystery, right? I feel like we need to have some mysterious thing. Whatever sprinkle of electricity in our brains that makes us human, I don't think that's ours to understand.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Oh, I mean, you're going to have a lot of mystery then in this episode, you're going to enjoy this because a lot of this

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Good, good, good.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

really weird and adoy, the brain, it's complicated. Nobody on earth is going to tell you this is how the brain works.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Right? And that makes sense because it's a brain studying the brain. So there's no way for the brain to understand itself,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

can't transcend, right?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

synchronous, right? That if it did, it would create this vacuum that would open a wormhole that swallows the universe.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

It's a black hole in your mind.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, in the universe.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

you should, if we can understand how like a kidney works or a liver works, you know, in theory, we should be able to do the same thing with a brain, but no,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

But can a kidney understand how a kidney works? That's the question. Ha ha ha!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

mean, that's actually a fair point. That's a fair counterpoint. And, and so mighty podcasters that we may be, I'm not going to be able to tell you this either about how the human brain works, but I am going to give you a basic rundown of the regions of the brain, what they do, and some of the stories that I think just by hearing them is going to give you an idea of how crazy, complicated, unknowable, and absolutely bizarre the human brain is.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Let

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So let's kind of get an idea of what is going on in our think tanks by exploring the four basic regions of the brain.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I love this. I love this. I love how I feel like in the year end recap. We were like, we're going to stay light. We're not going to dig in the weeds. And here we go. Laura's going to teach us. We are going to teach you how the human brain works.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No, I just told you I'm not. I'm not going to do that because

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

She's got the answers and I got the quips and that's why we make a podcast. Let's go.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Fuck you.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Ha ha ha ha ha ha!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So it's not simple, but each Of these four sections or lobes that I'm going to talk to you about, they have a thousand substructures. So it's, there's your street, there's your zip code, there's your county, and your state. So just keep that in mind that the, the locations I'm talking about, I'm talking about brain states. There are so much more, so many other things in there. And if you want to know more, Go to medical school, cause that's the only way

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

brain state, in the middle of my lobe. My That kind of vibe.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Starting in the front. Frontal lobes. Clever name, right? So, these are located right behind your forehead. And that thick ass skull designed to protect these babies. And this is the largest lobe in the brain. And makes up most of our cerebral cortex. Which, I'm going to tell you Is the brainiest part of our brain. So

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

The most brainy. It tracks.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

the cerebral cortex is all that wrinkly bit that you see in your Halloween jello mold. Right. You know, the, the little, yeah, the curves that is your cerebral cortex is the outer part of our brain. And that is what makes humans seem human and our cerebral You know what? I'm just going to call it CC. Our CC, cute little nickname, Our CC is more developed than in animals and that gives us the ability to really think our way out of shit that animals can't. Like the Donner Party killing a grizzly bear in the middle of winter without proper weapons. Like, these are the things that we can do. And the frontal lobes are responsible for a lot of things. Just some examples. Executive function, so planning, organizing, self monitoring, all that kind of stuff. Behavioral and emotional control. Regulating emotions, moods, reading the emotions of others, that, um, social aspect.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So it seems like a lot of the things that people struggle with these days. Mm

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

our frontal lobes are falling out of the front of our face.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

hmm.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Language, expressive language, speech production, and decision making, so making decisions and solving problems.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So basically, just a few minor things that separate us from the animals, right?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Just a few minor things. Uh, and you're right,'cause it's pretty fucking important. This is often described as the area of the brain that holds your personality. This is the section of the brain that responsible for all the day-to-day thoughts that you have.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And this is weird that you mention this because like when I think about it, my thoughts are like right behind my forehead. Like that's where my thoughts are. Did you feel your thoughts in your brain? Is that a normal thing?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I don't, but I know tension headaches occur and it's usually right there.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So like your internal monologue or whatever, it's not like you don't feel it like just right here. Like my head's huge. Like I'm not thinking from the back.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I've never thought about it, about where it's coming from.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I'm

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

mean, but you absolutely are, you're here, like if you're having like that internal monologue, that is absolutely where it is, in the front. There you go, there you go.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

with my body. Give me a wellness channel on Instagram.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

You're gonna teach the rest of us how to do it.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Open the chakras!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

But yeah, I do. I think that's weird, but I also think it's cool. Just like everything else with the brain! So, if you can imagine the importance of that, you can think of when things go wrong here, they go pretty fucking wrong. And to illustrate this point, let's get into the story, the story that kicked podcast, which was Phineas Gage.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

What are we gonna do today? That's Phineas and Ferb, sorry. I'm sorry. Did you get that or was that just No, okay, never mind.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

In Vermont, USA, Phineas Gage was a 25 year old railroad foreman. His job was to clear rocks for the new rail lines by use of explosives, and Mr. Gage was about to have a very bad day at work.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Was his boss gonna schedule a last minute meeting on his calendar that was just called chat?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No. No, it was way worse than that because that's what that sounds like now, right? A very bad day at work. That's what that sounds like. Oh, no, no, no. Times have changed.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

one they're just gonna rearrange his, um, brain a little

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, exactly. So the process of clearing rock at this time, it was to drill a hole into the rock, put in an explosive charge, pack the hole with sand and that directs the blast, right? Light the fuse and step far, far away. To do the sand packing, one would use a tamping rod, which is a large metal rod that was about 10 to 15 pounds and 3 feet long.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So basically when they designed it they thought, Hmm. What tool can we create that would make the best, most deadly projectile?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Kind

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

do that!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

they needed it to be heavy, right, because it's got to get the sand down in there and it needed to be long enough to go far, but, but yes, you're, you're completely right. Because on this very bad day at work, the tamping rod that Phineas was using created a spark. It set off the charge prematurely. Poor Gage. He was right above it. The explosion drove the rod up out of the hole. And right into his head. My notes, Rachel, I have an image of exactly where it landed. Can you describe what you see for the listener?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So I'm seeing a depiction here that shows a long metal rod going into a skull in, you know, the spot that you would put your contour, right? You're going to put your contour

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Right below the

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

your cheekbone. in the hollow of your cheek. So it's entering going behind the eye and it's coming out the top of the skull where a millennial might try to put their slightly off center center part. that's where exactly mine is where it's not centered, just a little bit off to the side and that's where it's popping up at the crown of his head. And, as you can imagine, if you've had a rod exploded through your head, there's not a perfect cut. This, we're not, we're not, this isn't a hole punch,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, it didn't like make a perfect hole and poof. Mm hmm.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Mm hmm. There is some collateral damage, unfortunately. It looks like the top of his head has a lot of cracks, if those aren't just the normal kind of seams that

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

are not.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And, uh, you know, a couple, a couple of those, and then just, just a hole, and it looks like, um, I'm trying to think of a good analogy for this. Like, um, like a pie crust, right? When it's got a nice egg glaze on it. Mmm, now I'm hungry. Mm hmm.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. Well, you're hungry for brains. Uh, but Phineas, despite these terrible injuries, he lived. And in fact,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

is shocking. Did it go Okay, I had to ask, because I didn't see it in the notes. Did it go all the way through, or did they have to pull it

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

yes, it went all the way through. It went into his cheekbone behind his eyeball, out of the top of his head

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

oh, okay, because I was gonna I thought there was you said there was a Y part at the end.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Nope, mm so, he, not only did he live, right after the accident, he seemed like he was okay.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Oh god,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

he was conscious. He was bleeding, but he recognized his friends. He called them by their name.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

He's like cracking jokes.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Not quite, but he was hauled off the site in an ox cart, cared for by his family doctor, Mr. Harlow. Dr. Harlow, sorry. And he got a really nasty infection from, again, the rod shoved

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, I'm, I'm, the, this, he's probably got all his poop hands all over it, all, I mean, they were not sanitary.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, uh, and that took him five weeks to recover from the infection, but after that, he was recovered. He was blind in his left eye and he had some facial weakness on that side. You know, can't do a full smile, can't really control the, the eyeball, but he was going to live. And that would be interesting enough that someone could survive this and be normal. But That's not why Phineas Gage's case is world famous. He is probably the most famous neurological patient of all time because after this patient, as they say, Gage was no longer Gage.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And that in itself is kind of a tragedy, because you've got a picture of him in here right now, and I'm gonna be so honest. Smash.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

He is! He I was like 25 year old, like, you know, railroad tamper. tampin Oh God, he's got he's gotta have muscles. Yeah!

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

hairline on him. That's a shame. It was not passed on. Mm.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

truly, because after he physically recovered, his physician, Dr. Harlow, he knew him prior to the accident. He started taking extensive notes on Gage's personality changes, and I'm going to read the quotes because I can't summarize these any better than, than Dr. Harlow did. He remembers past events correctly as well as before the injury. Intellectual manifestations are feeble. So he dumb, uh, and he is Being exceedingly capricious and childish, but with a will as indomitable as ever, he's particularly obstinate will not yield to restraint when it conflicts with his desires. Harlow also noted that Gage's employers, they had thought of him as a very capable foreman, but considered the change in his mind so marked that they could not give him his place again. So he lost his job, not because he could not physically work, but because of his temperament. He is fitful, irreverent, Indulging at times in the grossest profanity, which was not previously his custom. Impatient of restraint or advice when it conflicts with his desires. A child in intellectual capacity and manifestations, he has the animal passions of a strong man. Dot, dot, dot. That's just that ominous or like, what does that mean? Dr. Harlow?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

ooh, he likes his animal passions maybe, per

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Uh, it sounds like to me that he maybe almost raped somebody.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Oh, that's fair,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

That's how I read

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

fair. Yeah, I read about him independently and he like lacked a lot of, um, Inhibitions,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I think I remember hearing something about him peeing like publicly. Yeah. Like in a corner or something.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

that's what I think of when I think of old Gage. And I think it's an important question to ask. Was all of this because of the Rod, or did Homeboy just happen to discover Andrew Tate's style podcast around the same time? Because maybe his anti social personality is really just alpha male

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

You know, the parallels there are disturbing and. Noted. Do you know what I mean?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, it's just like, you could spend hours and hours digesting this content, or we could just give you a quick rod to the brain, guys. Like, your choice, your choice.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

frontal lobe damage and you can become an alpha male ASAP.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Exactly. I say, let's sign them up for it.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So this was the first case where medicine could definitively say that a brain injury changed someone's personality. And in the mid 1800s, that was a big deal. The, the brain was a mystery at the time. They knew it was important, but not really how it worked pretty much at all.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And that makes sense, cause like, they were just coming to understand electricity as a whole, right? And that's kind of important to how the whole shrigamarole up there works, as I understand it.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. And, and this was a time where phrenology was still a thing. Do you know what

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yes, a criminal skull shape. I think that's a 30 Rock reference somewhere, right? They make a joke about

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I do criminal shape, but I don't know about, I guess. Yeah. Phrenology, I guess falls in the same thing, but I know phrenology is like a, like kind of like fortune telling, Like they feel the lumps on your skull and tell you about your personality. So it, it's just nonsense. And Gage's case really began this entire field of brain science. This direct correlation between structural damage to the brain and personality was completely revolutionary.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Which is a step up from as we were talking where they thought just being pretty or hot made you a good person. Which maybe that's what affected Gage as he got less hot. So,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Could be,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

prove it wrong.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Well, and also I think of, like, a traumatic injury, even if, like, nothing was changed in your brain, right? You are changed! Yeah, but I Yeah,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

but everybody in 1848 had trauma, there was not a non traumatized person to be seen. This was two years after the Donner Party, mind you, so.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

There you

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I'm just gonna shanghai, I don't even know where that reference comes from, I'm just gonna take over this whole podcast and make it about the Donner Party.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Let's do one. I'm, I'm here for it.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I was going to, but it's a little bleak. I think only a few of the kids got eaten, but a lot of the adults got eaten. And I was going to do just dark realities of wagon trains in general, but guess who mostly dies on the regular ones is children and women.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Children make sense, but I feel like women have more longevity.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Oh, they survived the Donner party better because women are better in intense survival situations in general because we have slower metabolisms, which is why we're all so fat.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Mm hmm.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Just kidding. We're survivors. We're built to survive.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Built different.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, we're built for tough. That's why they call me the Extraordinary Machine, baby.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

You sound like the Macho Randy Man Savage or whatever. Okay. We're really getting off. Okay. All

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, we got a lot of brain to cover still.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

do. We do. Okay. Back to Gage. So, he spent some time as a freak show attraction for P. T. Barnum. He's traveling around with his tamping

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

for him. Get that bag.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. they think that he actually eventually recovered kind of some of his, his old personality and became a new kind of normal because he did manage to hold down a pretty steady job as a stagecoach driver for years, which apparently would have required a fair amount of, forward thinking and planning. Exactly. Uh, but no one really knows for sure. Record keeping from 200 years ago is shitty. died 12 years after his accident from seizures that undoubtedly were caused by the accident.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, something about an iron rod through the head doesn't really scream longevity.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Truly. And after he died, uh, his doctor, Dr. Harlow was bequeathed. That's the word they use. I don't know what that meant. Did they ask him? I don't know. but he got his skull and tamping iron and those items, they are still on display at the Warren Anatomical Museum. At Harvard in Boston, Massachusetts,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

You know, I like the idea of bequeathing other people's body parts. Um, I think that that is a solid thing to do. So Laura, I am going to bequeath your left coccyx. Nope. Just your one coccyx. you, only got the

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

you only have the one I was gonna say,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I changed

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

you only have the

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I didn't update my notes. I'm gonna bequeath your coccyx to the satanic temple because I know how much you love satanist.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Oh, true. Uh, well.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Originally, I had weenus, but you can't donate it

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

It's floppy. You can't.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

well, yeah, it would disintegrate. I thought a weenus was a bone. What do I know?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No, it's just the tip of your ulna. Well, yeah, the weenus is just skin, but

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I learned that because that's the kind of effort I put into these notes.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

A plus. A plus, Rachel. All right. So what I find interesting about these findings, these things that happened with Gage, we see them today. There's a ton of serial killers, other violent offenders. They are found usually to have experienced some kind of frontal lobe damage in their lives. That frontal lobe, it's pretty freaking important in making humans human. So this is like the first time that we really learned that. On to the next lobe of your big, sexy brain. That is the parietal lobe. No, you gotta go a little bit farther back. So it sits behind your frontal lobe, and is kind of above your ears. Yeah, right where your headphone things are. And this is your sensory processing headquarters. Touch, taste, pain. All the things that your senses gather. This is where your brain takes in information and makes sense of the world around you. How could this go wrong? You may ask. Well, in about a million ways, but I'm going to tell you about a really crazy one hemispatial neglect

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, how could it go wrong? I mean, it seems very haphazard that any of this exists in general, so it just like, it's a miracle that it works at all. The fact that most people turn out normal and credible. But the fact that you said neglect in there hap, hap, has, what is it?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Hemispatial.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Hemispatial neglect. Now, this sounds like something else I'm supposed to be taking care of. Like neglect. I'm supposed to be doing something. Um, because I'm probably not doing it and now I'm going to be anxious about

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

no, you're not neglecting anything.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I'm not neglecting my hemispatial.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No, you are not. And you would, you would know. Okay. So this one, it's hard to explain. Bear with me. I had to watch a few videos to really grasp how this works. Your brain is split into hemispheres, basically left and right sides of your brain when it comes to vision, they control the opposite side. So your right side of the brain. processes vision from your left eye, vice versa. And you can really see this in action with brain injuries to the parietal lobe because damage to your right side of the brain will affect your left side of vision and perception. Same thing on the other side, so it's like backwards. And so some people who have damage to the parietal lobe, usually that comes from a stroke, which is not a traumatic brain injury, it's an acquired brain injury, they have a complete lack of perception on one side of their body. And I don't mean that they can't see it or feel it or hear it. I mean, it just doesn't exist. People, objects, sensations, whatever. It's like it's not there. They, they don't even know it's not there. It's not like losing vision on one side. Cause if you lose vision on one side, you'll know that there's a gap. And you just think, Oh, well I can just turn my head and expand my field of vision so I can see on the left. Exactly. It's not the case with hemispatial neglect. It is just gone. Out of mind, out of sight. One side of the world doesn't exist. So food on one side of a plate doesn't get eaten. They only shave or put makeup on one side of their face. Because in their mind, they don't exist. The other side just doesn't exist. They can't draw properly. I put some stuff in the, the notes in terms of like, what they try to copy. They can draw half of a clock, half of a face. They can't even conceptualize the other side of that thing. It's their imagination doesn't even exist on that side. It's just gone.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And you know what? Is it possible to have this like, in a migrating sense? Cause this sounds a lot like my husband whenever he's trying to find something.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

That's just males. ha ha ha

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

That's like my yuck yuck joke. Oh, husbands!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Oh yeah, no respect, no respect. Ha ha ha

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

that's the level I've reached. Ha ha ha!

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So what's even more bizarre, I think, than just missing half of your world is the fact that they really don't miss it. They don't describe it to people, or they don't even really think there's a problem. When they're pressed to describe it, they don't know how to, how to, Talk about it because it's like trying to describe something you've never seen or never even thought of. Of course you don't miss it. It doesn't exist to you. You can't imagine what it would be like to be there. It, it's not about sight or sensation. It's about the representation of the world in your brain is just gone.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

You know, it makes you wonder what is happening all around us right now that we're just not perceiving?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

A part of your brain? Yeah, could be.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

happening and our brain is just like Nope, not in my reality,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Totally! The implications of all of these things, like when you really like dig into them and like think about it in an abstract way, you're like, holy shit! And,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

and then you open a wormhole and you, like, get sucked in And the reality is over. Sorry, I got too close.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

These people, they're trying to retrain their brains to look for it, but it's hard. It's like anything you have to learn from the beginning. Yeah, you have to do it like you're a child. And, and they will often never get over that bias for a one side. And I just think that's such a crazy way to live.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

could you? How could you teach somebody something that they don't know exists? It'd be like, all of a sudden, getting a new sense. And, like, imagine that sound didn't exist in your world. And now, you wanna learn how to hear, I'm gonna teach you how to hear. I'm gonna teach you how to hear. Okay, all you gotta do, you just gotta listen. Listen for sounds. And you're like, oh, what's a sound? Um, so shit, I didn't get that far in my manual. You just hear them.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

How are we talking right now if you can't hear?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

And they're like, I don't know, as

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I think your information is just being telepathically beamed into my head.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

far as they're concerned, yes, you're getting it. I'm happy to see that you're getting like the, the insanity that this is kind of like ramping up. Okay. Next one, occipital lobe. This is the back of your brain, right above your cerebellum. And that's that big wrinkly thing that you see in brain diagrams. We'll get to that later, but so the occipital is actually our smallest lobe of the brain, which is funny to me because we're such sight based creatures and yet it's, it's very small and it is where it vision is processed. So anything having to do with sight, visual perception, color, form, motion. Damage to this area can result in blindness, either total blindness or partial blindness, visual inattention, which is kind of like what I talked about with hemispatial neglect, but not totally, spatial analysis, facial recognition, and a lot more. But one of the most interesting things that can happen if this area is damaged, is what is called blindsight. And this is what it's called when someone who is actually blind can see. They're just not conscious that they can see.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So what I'm hearing is blind people are faking it? Is that correct? Uh, cause I knew it! No, just kidding. But seriously, like, would they flinch if I threw something at them? Because like, I know certain reflexes are processed in different parts of the brain.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Bingo. You've nailed some of it.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Woo, give me a degree in neurology, baby.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

in brain, brain degree.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I'm Dr. Brain.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So, all right, buckle up a little bit for some bummer index shit.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Always. Macaque.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

was discovered through animal experimentation in the 60s. Doctors were slicing out pieces of macaque monkey brains, kind of just to see what would happen. And,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

sanctioned, you know.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

yeah, and a subject that they named Helen. Also aside, why do they give him names? This is just gross.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

should be subject A,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, yeah, something like that. Anyway, um, she had her entire occipital lobe removed. She was completely blinded because she was missing the part of her brain that was responsible for sight. But, they noticed under certain conditions, Helen seemed like she could see. So her pupils would dilate in bright lights. She would blink when items came near her eyes. And after a lot of specialized monkey behavioral tests, and what those are, I don't know. I don't know how they determine that

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

they probably included bananas.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, maybe. they saw Helen seemed to sense things. The presence of objects, where they were located, shapes, colors. She was also able to walk around completely new environments with no problems. As if she could see

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So it's like her eyes were still generating and logging data, her brain just could not translate that data into anything meaningful,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

maybe

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

is so weird. Cause like, okay, random tangent site itself is such a fucking gift, man. Cause like, how am I standing here on top of a mountain tearing up at the majesty. And it's just light bouncing off other mountains that are miles and miles away from me. What?! What?! It's a simulation, it's gotta be.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

kidding. It's just incredible.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

it is, it is incredible. It's absolutely incredible. and so monkeys, They're all well and good, but they're not people, right? So what happens with people, when doctors knew to look for it, they started seeing it in people as well. So these humans who had damage to their visual cortex, very extensive damage, were totally blinded. But they were able to describe items in front of them, and they could sometimes catch things that were thrown at them. But they, they were, they were still blind. They could not see. And so what it seems like is that their brain is taking in visual data unconsciously without properly processing it, kind of like what you mentioned. And what I think is even more interesting, the patients didn't even know it. They did not like these experiments. they did not think they, any of their guesses would be correct. They had to be hard pressed to say anything about an object in front of them. Like, the doctor would be like, what color is the ball? And they'd be like, I'm not, I can't, I don't know, I'm fucking blind. You know what I mean? Like, they wouldn't want to answer. But when they did, when they guessed, they were right more often than those that were in the control groups.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Now, I don't wanna be trite, but there's a metaphor in there somewhere about all of the problems plaguing us. But the fact that a blind person can guess the color of the ball, they can see it, they just can't access that

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

are what we tell ourselves we are.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Well, no, they can't tell themselves to see, right? I mean, but

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

but you are, If you have spent a really long time emotionally coming to grips with the fact that you can't see anymore the way you used to, that's an emotional hurdle to go through anyway, that you have acceptance. And if you've reached that acceptance, then are you gonna be super open to these? impulses, you know what I mean? These gut feelings that you have about sight. No, you're going to shut it down.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Whatever brains, my brain, my whatever is done. Just kidding. Too much thinking about the brain.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

It's crazy. And, and so some doctors, they don't think that this exists. Others say that it do, others say that it do.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

they're all fakers. I, we all knew it, they just want to take their dog with them everywhere. We get it. I want to take my dogs with me everywhere too.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No, you don't, you hate your

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I don't hate them. I just wish that they went to college. And grew up and moved out.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So one theory about how this works is that even though the vision center of the brain is destroyed, there might be some kind of islands in there that are still firing, just not firing hot and heavy enough. for the conscious brain to get the signal. And another theory is that somewhere along the optic nerve that connects your eyes to your brain, there's processing going on in transit, right? It's going to different areas of the brain, but we just don't understand how it works. Next lobe up is cerebellum. That's that wrinkly little thing I mentioned before, kind of on the underside of your brain. This controls complex motor functions and balance, and it has a big job in coordinating your voluntary movements. It does a good amount of coordinating itself. It's processing information sent by other parts of the brain, like your spinal cord and your nervous system. So it kind of takes all this information up the chain and then relays it back down. So if you want to catch and throw a ball, there's a lot of motor coordination going on there. The cerebellum is the hub for all this to and fro from brain to body, back and forth. And it really fucking fast speeds.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And while I'm sitting here in awe, I will also note that this is incredible. This whole process, right? It used to always leave me, like, speechless how people can zoom in and out in traffic on a morning commute. Everybody could, like, navigate the physics of cars and timing and anticipating human behavior that were not all crashing into each other simultaneously at the same time. And then on the morning commute, but then they could get into work and then be such fucking idiots. Like, every person I worked with that was dumb, successfully drove in that day. How many times do I have to say, per my last email? But they can just weave in and out and merge flawlessly. Insane.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I think it's, because that's like motor skill, right? And those social aspects of our brain are so much more

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

They guys learned how to rod through it. Rod.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So the, this structure is also pretty important. so you might be surprised to find that in 2014, medical science discovered a 24 year old woman that just did not have a cerebellum. What

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

That's nuts.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

what was even more amazing? She was fine or mostly fine. So she came into the hospital because she had been feeling dizzy and nauseous lately. She, exactly. She told the doctor that she had always been unsteady on her feet.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Same.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

She had had a hard time learning to walk, according to her mother. And when they CT scan, the doctors could see why, the cerebellum, the motor section of her brain was gone. It was just empty. It was filled with cerebrospinal fluid and there's just a blank space.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And that's a functioning person.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yes. Yes. And so this finding was very rare, obviously. There are cases of this, but they're almost always found in small children, babies with severe developmental issues, often results in a very short and a very sickly life. cases of people living. Fairly normal lives like this was pretty much unheard of and yet here she is

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, her rest of her brain really started doing some lifting. It never

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Heavy lifting. Yeah. Yeah

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

that just goes to show you that person in your life, they are missing, potentially, a part of their brain. Could be. Right.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Can't blame them, you know, you don't even know what they're walking around not knowing Okay, last lobe, cause this is getting hella long. And, uh, I did have to leave out a ton of other crazy conditions that I found. I'm gonna have to do another one of these episodes, granted that somebody likes it. But, I fuckin love the brain! So, the temporal lobe You wanna guess where it's located?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Under my chin.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

No! At your temples! Heh. Temples. Yeah. Near the ears on either side of your, your noggin, it helps process information from your senses. So communication, memory, language, processing emotions, a lot of different stuff going on in there. So we have arrived at our last case of Henry Molaison. That's a guess on the pronunciation. I really don't know there. Sorry, Henry.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

He probably doesn't remember either.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Henry had been experiencing epileptic seizures since he was ten, after a bicycle crash. So, seriously, everyone wear your fucking helmets. Yes. Got progressively worse as he got older, and at age 27, in 1953, he was desperate, so, Doctors decided to try a surgery to relieve these seizures. They decided to do a

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Do you want

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

bilateral medial temporal lobectomy to surgically resect the anterior two thirds of his hippocampi, parahippocampi, cortices, anterior cortices, piriform cortices, and amygdala. Whatever that fucking means. I don't know. So, what they were trying to

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

said those words.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I would have been, uh, uh, uh, amygdala.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. Basically, they were trying to take out the part of his brain that was causing the seizures and this was the heyday of lobotomies and Psychosurgery was kind of all the rage. So they got his permission drilled into his skull and took out some parts of his brain Um, but somehow they took out too much, uh, the front half of his hippocampus on both sides and most of the amygdala, both of which are located in that temporal lobe, were taken out. And I had a hard time deciphering if it was accidentally that they took out more than they intended or they just didn't know what would happen, right, if they took out this much. Either way. What happened happened, and that was when Henry recovered from the surgery. He was completely unable to form new memories.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Now I may be going out on a limb here, but I feel as if Henry should be entitled to some compensation

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Oh, uh, Brown and Crouppen? Yeah, uh huh, uh huh, a hundred

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

say They took out my client's amygdala. Like, come on guys. Let's, and you can't put it back in.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Nope, it does not fit

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

what those doctors thought when he woke up and he

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I thought, I was thinking about the doctor who did this, because he wasn't really involved in, like, the later, like, studies of them. I'm like, who is this guy? How did this guy cope with that shit? Like I don't know. I have definitely a lot to unpack here that we don't have time for, but very, very interesting. So, Henry, he would forget events almost immediately, about 30 seconds after any interaction. And what was so interesting was that he was not impaired in any other way. Sense of humor intact. Personality remained the same, unlike Gage. Uh, his IQ was the same as it ever was. No perception difficulties, no motor difficulties. He could move around just the same as he ever could before. Henry described his condition as, quote, like waking from a dream. Every day is alone in itself. He could remember some of his life up until the surgery, but not all of it. And he seemed to not kind of have a lot of contacts for the memories. He would forget people the moment he turned away from them, re meet them moments later.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Uh, so kind of like me at a networking event.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah. But at least you would remember

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

That I

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I was talking to somebody or like, you know, maybe I know you have a little bit of facial blindness, but like the tie they were wearing or something, you'd

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

the second someone says their name, it just,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Same. I'm terrible, terrible with names, but this was like, he

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

start saying they took out my amygdala.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

And so this whole thing, it was a big shock to the metal community.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Really? That taking out brains has negative impacts?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

They, they thought that memory was an all over the brain kind of thing, but Henry, he proved that they were really wrong, uh, and he became a kind of medical superstar for the rest of his life. People all over the world would come in to talk to him, test him, see what they could figure out about memory in the human brain.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I hope he rode that wave as best he could, man.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I think that he did. From all the things that I read, he seemed to be in very good spirits, uh,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

He's like, Whoa, where am I? What's going on? This is awesome! Every morning, they're like, Here you are, Henry. We're going to give you this awesome breakfast and we're going to take you to be studied. He's like, Hell yeah! I don't care that I did the same shit yesterday. It's all new and exciting to me. Let's be like vacation every day. Maybe Henry's on to something. Henry's

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So, uh, much like Blindsight, doctors discovered that he could He actually could remember some things, he just didn't know that he could. So doctors would have him practice a physical task, like drawing something, And he would forget that he had done the practice immediately. It was just gone. He didn't have any idea that he did it. But over time, he made steady progress at that task. So the pictures that he was drawing were getting better and better each time.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

He's like, a flower? What's a flower? I've never seen a flower, never drawn a flower before in my life! And, he's like, wait a minute, the shading on your stem's not quite right

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

yeah, so it indicated that this kind of muscle memory of some kind was taking hold. His higher brain couldn't recognize the memory, but it's like his hand was getting better. He could also draw an accurate and detailed map of his home, even though he should have forgotten. So, yeah. Uh, what the next room looked like 30 seconds after leaving it. So it's like these routine muscle memory items kind of got burned in there somehow

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

you do drills when you play sports.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Exactly. So, Henry's condition gave doctors a unique opportunity to look at all these different kinds of memory, which I didn't know there was more than one kind of memory, but of course that makes sense. Spatial, episodic, topographical, conscious, and unconscious memory. All different. And. Um, potentially in different areas of the brain. So one of the findings was that these repetitive tasks that he was taught were stored and retrieved from different areas of the brain, places we didn't even realize, places that he did not get cut out. And it's all massively technical. I do not understand it. I read at least three or four articles about it. And it is just so interesting.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And this is actually reminding me when you said episodic memory. I was like, why does that ring a bell? It's because back in the Big Talk days, it came up when we did an episode on drinking, which I need to revisit. So they didn't need to take out this guy's brain. All they had to do was understand that different parts of memory were stored in different parts of the brain when a blackout drunk person couldn't remember what they did the night before, but yet, They still remembered how to walk and like how to do a bunch of different shit. I feel like they should have clued them in a little bit about memory before just like slicing open the kid's head.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

well, I don't think that they meant to do that to him, but I mean if you're

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Well, no, I really that

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I don't know. I don't know that that I could see how somebody could make that argument, but

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, it's just like it's there's evidence of the different kinds of memory without You know, like being like what does this do? What does this have to do?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Henry, cause he was like, let's leave it all on the court. But Helen, the monkey, let's like not do that to living things. And

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

But Henry, like I said, he was a good sport about all this. He was happy to participate until he died in 2008 at the age of 81.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

that was a shock to him.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah, every

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

He's like, I'm old? What? Yeah. He

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

he had to live in care his whole life, as you can imagine, you know, burn the fucking house down. He can't cook food, you know, all this kind of stuff. but when he died, he did agree to give his brain to science

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

bequeathed it or somebody did.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

bequeathed it. Yeah. Uh, sign this paper. Okay. Uh, and science has been having a ball with this brain ever since it has been sliced into 2, 401 sections placed on slides and it is used as a permanent neurological research resource and a digital 3d atlas of his brain is available online for all to see free of charge.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

So he lives on.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

He does.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

His memory

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Haaaa. There was one quote that I didn't put in the notes. There was one researcher that he worked with extensively. And he said, you know, it's all you live and you learn. You learn and I live. I know, right?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Henry's a hysterical person.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Exactly. I mean, I think he would have been a really cool guy to get to know. I've seen pictures of him. he looked like

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

of, yeah, I feel like he could have handled a lot of, like, adversity and, with that attitude, you

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yeah,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Or is just not remembering the secret of life. Like my dogs.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yep. Just, it just goes to show, man, too much getting in your head, too much navel gazing, all that kind of stuff, it is not good for anybody.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

you're too worried about what you can't see, you can't see what you can see.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Exactly.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Put that on a

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Okay, so that is Lara's crash course on the human brain, and

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And that was pretty fast, for all things considered. For the number of words that were written on a page,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I'm going to take that compliment and I'm going to internalize it. And so what really jumped out at me about all this research was not just the hard life that people with traumatic brain injuries live because it's really fucking hard. It's

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

It's not the same as TikTok Watchers.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

no. no. no. It's not the same. They're dealing with real, real shit here, and they're suffering, and they don't know how to fix themselves. but really what jumped out at me was the unknowable nature of the human brain. Everyone has got one. Each one probably functions differently. Each person has this different level of neuroplasticity where, like, one side of the brain can compensate for another. There are these deviations in how we may store memories or thoughts or emotional truths. And some people might have faulty wiring in whatever area of the brain that is responsible for emotional truths. Who the fuck knows? But consciousness, personality, whatever it is, it's in there. Somewhere.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

The spark of life and what makes a person, a person,

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

It's in there, but we don't know where. We don't know how it works. And this just unraveling consciousness and self. Are you really a person? Are you just a collection of structures and electric impulses? It's all there. Some really heavy shit, and I'm thankful that I have the structures that allow me to think those thoughts. So,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

to not really fully gasp it either, because as

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Wormhole.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

wormhole.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

So, socialites, just be thankful for your big brains. They are one in a billion, and take care of them, appreciate them.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

And if you want to appreciate what you heard today, nothing gets our brains a humming more than a five star rating and review on whatever podcasting platform of your choice. You

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

gives our brains a big brain hard on.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yes, and it helps us protect it because otherwise we have to face the realities of being two nobodies podcasting into the world and our brains don't like that. I am. I am. I mean, I'm loving learning about how precious my brain is while I apply it with toxin, but, but we are also on the YouTube now. We did figure out a way to upload all of our podcast to be videos So if you're a YouTube podcast person, no longer will you need to get out your stupid Spotify app. I shouldn't say that because Spotify gods, please help us. but if you listen on YouTube, we've noticed that the discoverability there. It's much better than a regular podcasting app. So, if you do happen to be a podcast listener, or just a YouTube person in general, give us a follow, give us a rating, a review there. We appreciate it. It's been, a wild ride in the few days that we've been on it. I'm like, why are we sleeping on this, this

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

I sent, I, I took a screenshot, but it was like, you've been discovered based on adult baby diaper lovers, like all this kind of stuff. And I was like, you know, never things that I thought that I would see, but, uh, here we are. Yeah. These searches led people to you. Number one, ABDL. Number two, vagina shave. Number three, adult diaper.

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

the thing about it is if we had seen this, if we had showed this to ourselves in 2020, would we have pursued this concept?

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Yes,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

I'm just happy. It's not all 65 year old men, right? I can see the breakdown and there's young people in there. So we need to rethink about what we are because maybe we're not just like a bunch of weirdos looking at this. Maybe we're like a young person's first introduction to these things.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Gosh, I hope so. I want to be your cool aunt. I know things. Listen, no, you're

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

that. Ha ha ha ha ha. We could be your aunt that

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

okay, yeah, your aunt that wants to be cool, but your aunt that knows shit. Like, that is

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

teens. Yeah. And that's our aspiration. So maybe that's what it is. But it is also, it's more young people, but also like people in their 30s and stuff. So, you know, our people.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Check us out!

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

send us your rude thoughts at rude at employee society podcast. com. I wonder how many pieces of my brain would have to be missing before I would stop being able to regurgitate that. Um, and also you can

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Let's shove a steel rod in there and

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

See ya at the link in bio and of course Stay curious and keep marching to the beat of your own Sorry, that steel rod just went through my head. Cut it.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

​Exceedingly capricious. And chi capricious. Capricious is capricious, right?

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

Yeah, that sounds right.

lb_2_12-19-2024_210944:

Capric, uh,

rachel_2_12-19-2024_210942:

how to pronounce words, pronunciate words.