Controversy and Current Research

We have oodles of recorded observations and opinions about the brain, many of which agree with each other. But then come some curious cases which tend to cast doubt on everything we take as “established fact.” Perhaps most notable is the case of the Boy With No Brain.

John Lorber is a British neurologist who studies people with hydrocephalus, a condition characterized by abnormally increased levels of cerebrospinal fluid in the brain. Most people with this condition do not live very long, or live with severe mental disabilities. Lorber found a student at Sheffield University in England who has an IQ of 126, is an honors math student, and has practically no brain at all as we understand it.

A CAT scan revealed that he had but a millimeter of cortical brain tissue, where the average is 4.5 centimeters. The rest of his brain is mostly cerebrospinal fluid, but he does seem to have some of the more primitive brain structures. This case is not totally rare among hydrocephalics - of the most extreme form of hydrocephela, in which 95% of the cranial cavity is filled with fluid, half of those affected are extremely mentally retarded, and the other half have IQs over 100.  He became known as the Boy With No Brain.

This is a controversial topic, to be sure. Many neuroscientists reject the findings for some reason or other. One objection is that the brain scans were not properly analyzed, and that the exact calculations for the size and weight of the brain for the student mentioned above were not done. Lorber is aware of the dramatic nature of his claim, and his reply to this objection basically sums up to saying: I'm not stupid, and I wouldn't say this without evidence.

If you want to read more about this, you can take a look at the infamously titled review of Lorber's and others findings in the journal Science, right here : Is Your Brain Really Necessary?

Another review of this and other cases of hydrocephalus : Where is Consciousness? I've Lost It!

Cases like this may instill feelings of doubt, insecurity, and that notion of “why am I studying this perhaps I should be a janitor.” But never fear, mysteries only leave more room for ground-breaking research and ideas. Let this be a lesson that science generally concerns itself with the “normal majority” and is every so often greatly tweaked by some rare exceptions.

There is a lot of progress being made in analyzing brain functions and activity, and new things are being discovered almost daily. Christof Koch is one of the foremost researchers of the neural correlates of consciousness. He worked for many years towards this end with Francis Crick, one of the DNA guys.

Recent developments have allowed us (humans) to look at the activity of a single neuron. This is pretty cool, because it brings us to a level of detail that was almost unimaginable before this decade. 

Here is a great lecture by Christof Koch in which he mentions this, as well as some of his recent work on this subject.

If you'd like to read more about his research, here is a paper he wrote with Francis Crick on the subject:  The Neural Basis of Consciousness

Here is another take on the NCC by a distinguished philosopher, David Chalmers : What is a neural correlate of consciousness?

For a detailed and thorough account of the current information about the NCC, check out this Scholarpedia article, curated by Christof Koch himself : Neural Correlates of Consciousness