skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Patricia Roberts) (11/07/88)
From: chase@orc.olivetti.com (David Chase) > On the subject of brain "wiring", anybody have statistics on the occurrence of epilepsy in each sex? With different "bandwidth" between the hemispheres, I would expect the sexes to show a notable asymmetry. You'd have to be careful with these figures, because (I think) epilepsy is usually a side-effect of something else; a stroke, a brain tumor, brain surgery, or a blow to the head. It also can run in families; I don't know much about that. It is also more common in seriously retarded children. Drug withdrawal can also produces seizures that are very similar to epileptic seizures, though they eventually go away. It also happens that someone will have one seizure in their adolesence, do the standard treatment, and never have another. Take away all that, and I'm not sure you'd have much of a sample left. I'm speaking from experience and curiosity -- I whacked my head on some pavement pretty hard 11 years ago, had some seizures immediately afterwards, and spent three years taking Dilantin. During that time I met quite a few people who were taking Dilantin, talked to several neurologists, and read what I could find. David ================================================================== From: Alan J Rosenthal <flaps%dgp.toronto.edu@RELAY.CS.NET> References: <5688@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> <5715@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> <5719@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> Organization: University of Toronto djk@ernie.Berkeley.EDU (Doris J. Karlson) writes: >They found that the bundle of fibers that connects the two hemispheres of the >brain is consistently and significantly thicker in females than in males. Mental developments can affect the physical structure of the brain. So this is not evidence for built-in differences as opposed to cultural influences, as I believe it was intended to be. ajr
edhall@rand.org (Ed Hall) (11/11/88)
A warning: about a century ago studying brain anatomy was all the rage, only instead of measuring the thickness of the corpus callosum, they were measuring the size of the brain and the shape of the frontal lobes. Using these techniques, scientists managed to ``prove'' that non-white races were lighter of brain and thus intellectually inferior. The same ``proofs'' also were given for the intellectual inferiority of women. Of course, we now know that the correlation between brain weight and intelligence doesn't exist. It does, however, correlate highly with body size, which is why these scientists prefered to use Pygmys as representatives of the black race. And, of course, women just happened to be smaller on the average than men. (All of this is magnificently documented in Steven Jay Gould's ``The Mismeasure of Man.'' Given some of the claims I've seen made by certain contemporary sociobiologists, we haven't advanced very far in 100 years.) As to the original comment on Lacanian feminists' ideas--it's fascinating that they have turned what was essentially a patriarchial philosophy onto its head. But I don't see any more evidence for their point of view than the original. Like others have pointed out, there is a gross ethnocentrism implied by the male=logic, female=intuition assumptions they make. Not every culture was polluted by Aristotle and friends... -Ed Hall edhall@rand.org {...}!vortex!randvax!edhall {...}!hplabs!sdcrdcf!randvax!edhall
russ@uunet.UU.NET (Russell Lawrence) (11/17/88)
In article <5825@ecsvax.uncecs.edu>, edhall@rand.org (Ed Hall) writes: > As to the original comment on Lacanian feminists' ideas--it's > fascinating that they have turned what was essentially a patriarchial > philosophy onto its head. But I don't see any more evidence for their > point of view than the original. Like others have pointed out, there is > a gross ethnocentrism implied by the male=logic, female=intuition > assumptions they make. Not every culture was polluted by Aristotle and > friends... Hate to be nitpicky, but the use of the sexual metaphors, 'male' and 'female', to describe logical and intuitive thinking is much older than Aristotle and is also found in diverse cultures that were relatively untouched by Hellenistic philosophy. After all, Alexander the Great didn't really conquer the whole world. After much research, I'm convinced that the use of male and female imagery to describe modes of thought probably represents what historians would call a "recurrent idea"... not simply a "continuing" one. In other words, it tends to arise from the depths of the mind and is not simply propagated by verbal contact from one source to another. Recent neurophysiological research concerning the effects of androgen on brain lateralization may explain why the idea is 'recurrent'. Incidently, to the best of my knowledge, male/female symbolism is always associated with meditative disciplines aimed at *enhancing* the intuitive mode. As such, the symbolism is never perjorative in its native context though some of us may perceive it as such owing to the 'logic' bias in our own culture. -- Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 456-0001 {uunet,killer}!wpg!russ