The Brain, tonight on PBS's Nova

[moof]

There are several segments but this guy is the bees knees when it comes to the brain.
Vilayanur Ramachandran has been called a
Sherlock Holmes of neuroscience. Director of the
Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of
California, San Diego, and adjunct professor at the
Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla,
California, Ramachandran has brilliantly sleuthed his
way through some of the strangest maladies of
the human mind. He has done this by marrying
simple tools such as mirrors and cotton swabs
with an insatiably inquisitive mind and a tonic
sense of humor.

One of the areas in which he has made some of his greatest
strides is in the arena of phantom limbs, in which amputees and
even those born without one or more limbs feel pain and other
sensations in their missing body parts. Here, read Ramachandran's
vivid descriptions of his experiences with phantom-limb patients
and how he has managed to understand their singular dilemmas
and thereby help them.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/mind/

[Ripley]

1. Thanks for the info....sounds interesting.

But what exactly does that old saying "bees knees" mean?

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. It means "the dog's bollocks"

[moof]

3. There seems to be some uncertainess concerning the definition,

but here is a definition, supplied by Mr P Fonda of Paradise Valley, Montana. Mr Fonda,
a part-time honey-farmer, suggests that, as bees carry pollen in sacs around their legs, the phrase
refers to the concentration of goodness which can be found around the bee’s knobbly bits.

[0rganism]

4. Aargh! OPB only shows Nova at 11pm on Thursdays!

Tonight it's "Power of Myth" from 8pm onward.

Oh well, could be worse. Could be an "Antiques Roadshow" marathon.

[LastDemocratInSC]

5. Temporal lobe seizures - delusions of deity - and the pResident

Did anyone see the part of the after-effects of temporal lobe seizures and the patient who thought he was God? It turns out that many with this problem have intense religious experiences and delusions of grandeur. There has been speculation that the pResident suffers from this - perhaps an explanation of things is falling into place?

It seems that as the brain recovers from such a seizure that it tries to make sense of the intense emotions that well up during the event - hence all the talk of religion and higher callings. Over time the neural pathways that result from the seizure after-effects become strengthened. Religious and mystical experiences are a common thread among those with temporal lobe seizures.

Catch NOVA if you can ... all the other parts are interesting as well.

[moof]

6. exactly, this was a repeat and had seen it the first time,

but when the thread/s here at DU saying the chimp had to take meds for sizures the bells and sirens went off.