Brain Damage affecting Perception in multiple ways -part 1/2

[MrMegaMulp]

I seem to have inherited my fathers partial face-blindness (of around 60% on a test, average person scoring 80%) and you do really struggle to recognise people and sometimes struggle to remember/link names to people. However after seeing that some people have lost their ability to recognise faces almost entirely I feel much more appreciative of the brain, realising that at least I still can recognise a lot.

[BladesOfMunch]

Every few months, I cannot help but re-watch this clip (along with part 2). A personal favourite of mine, and also one that never fails to intrigue! The brain is beautifully complex.

[miceskin]

I wonder if he can see optical illusions of faces.

[lifeismasked]

I believe this people can no longer use the left hemisphere to make connection to a face. They use the right hemisphere and logically only see "shapes".

Maybe they should try to cover the right eye.

[MissBRJ]

"this is the nastiest one of all - this is me" That is good humour :) Sweetheart <3

[andysim2k2]

have you ever seen someone you know and it takes u a split second to realize who they really and that you actually know them ? this is kinda how you brain facial recognition process works. Now imagine if that split second was extended to a life time when you see a face you cannot make a distinctions of who that face belongs to..

[liu0313]

oh my goodness!! ='(

that's so sad. . .

I'm so overwhelmed with this grief, of not being able to recognize any face, even one that belongs to the owner..

[luciuswake]

The fact is that PTSD sufferers need to be tested for various agnosia's. I have had so many professionals who just prescribe ssri's and don't understand.

When one has PTSD, your Amygdala becomes Crown or CHief in your mental cognition. The Amygdala is the area responsible for automatic responses such as protecting your eye from dust and debris that may land in it. This part of the brain is now chief, and memory and cognition in other areas is reduced. Severely reduced immediately aft trauma

[zackvanhalen]

If he said the record looks like a plate with writing on it, does that mean he could recognize a plate?

[HitodamaKyrie]

@zackvanhalen He remembers that plates are plate shaped. If you showed him any small saucer shaped object, plate would probably be his first guess. Once he picked it up though, he was able to feel that it wasn't a plate, but that it was a record.

[Fers1296]

my dad has this diseasse. he had an accident playing football and he's now face-blindness. He doesn't even recognize me. The accident happened nearly like a year ago, and he still the same way...

[bpyjktgiuk]

Brain damage, brain chip - CHECK MY SITE.

[xoxAngelFirexox]

aww poor guy =(

[PeterBrane]

Seems that these neurologist have to study a bit of the theoretical brain science of Jeff Hawkins. HTM's (Hiarchical Temporal Memory) and the way they work can explain a lot about what's going wrong in these people's brains.

[majorvoltage]

If physical damage to the brain can alter our perception of the world, why are there still people who believe that their perception is somehow separate from their physical body and will float away to somewhere else when they die?

I recently had a mormon missionary approach me with his religion and when I asked him this, he was utterly unable to respond.

[VidaLivre888]

To oversimplify it, emergent properties, everything from brain function and psyche to renal function, are more then the product of their summed parts. No one to date has ever quantified this jump.

[hmmmindeed]

VidaLivre888 that is simply not true, especially renal function, To say it is more than the product of summed parts is a joke. At the brain, can you even imagine TRYING to quantify the 100 billion neurons in the brain, nevermind the trillions of connections they make on the 1000's of dendrites nevermind spatial and temporal summation relationships. This easily compensates for interpretation of the world etc

[pinksocko]

brain damage alters the way we perceive the world, and not the act of us perceiving it. i think that's what everyone clings to.

[majorvoltage]

If the brain damage makes you unconscious then it halts the act of perceiving the world.

[pinksocko]

there is also thought perception, and i hear people make the claim that we still still think while unconscious we just cant remember, sorta like a dream. i guess it could also be said that although there is unconsciousness due to a cease in information and synapse fire, there is still a receiver. there is a popular TV/satellite analogy that's used to explain it.

[evilinjuries]

@majorvoltage Eckhart Tolle said something about us being Human Beings. Human is form, Being is formless. There is some type of "being" within us, something that gives us life. Nobody really knows what happens when we die, not you, not Mormons... period.

[reverrned]

I find the second case in the video particulalry interesting.. seems like his cognition has lost most of its.. how should I call it gestaltian abilities... Could it be then that there might be some brain center associated with all the gestaltian stuff?

[machindia2008]

i think is the brain dont want to treat the information of face as important and treat it as rubbish. just like we see alot of face everyday, but if you ask me now do i remember the face of a gal or boy at lunch? I wont remember. cos my brain too lazy to remember and feel that it useless to remember. His brain feel remember face is a tired process. he got to train his brain to take faces as important stuff. Anyway simpler way of putthing this, all asian look the same dont you think.

[Yakshinian]

too bad the video is dumbed down. I'd really like to see the full interviews. Less about how the first fellow was feeling, more about what he was experiencing - which seems to be what he wanted to talk about anyway.

[StevenErnest]

My eloquent comment got ate by the YT fairies. :(

[StevenErnest]

Very fascinating, Quarkscois! It's ironic how we learn so much about the brain by the effects of damage to it. Not being able to perceive my face would be a blessing in disguise. ^_^

(Sorry I'm getting to your vids late, but was busy with "life," and had to finish mine; I appreciate your kind comment there ;)

On to Part 2...!

[QuarksAreStrange]

Brain damages give us a window on the way our brain deals with the outside world.

This concept explained and much more in the documentary series "Brain Story" by the extraordinary British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).

Click the links in the description section for more info.