Half Head Man

Seems like the lesson here isn’t “don’t do drugs or drink” or even “don’t do drugs or drink before driving”, but simply “wear your seatbelt”. What happened to him could have happened to a sober driver, too. I was involved in a head-on collision once. It didn’t matter that I was completely sober. What saved me was my seatbelt and airbag.

He wasn’t using it anyway.

That would have damaged his frontal cortex which is implicated in impulse control. Many call it the “executive” of the brain. Without it, he would have an even harder time resisting drugs. It is possible that prior to the accident he already had frontal lobe impairment which contributed to his addiction.

Anyway, I notice a lot of mocking and judging of this man by people who know absolutely nothing about neuroscience. Knock it off.

@Sandi

He should still have emotions since these are processed mainly in the limbic system, but he won’t have much ability to self-regulate those emotions and may be consciously unaware of them. Remember Dr. Harlow’s account of Gage. Such a person may actually grow to hate themselves if they can’t maintain accurate self-concept stability.

“Remembers passing and past events correctly, as well before as since the injury. Intellectual manifestations feeble, being exceedingly capricious and childish, but with a will as indomitable as ever; is particularly obstinate; will not yield to restraint when it conflicts with his desires.” Dr Harlow reports that Gage’s employers, “who regarded him as the most efficient and capable foreman … considered the change in his mind so marked that they could not give him his place again…. He is fitful, irreverent, indulging at times in the grossest profanity (which was not previously his custom), manifesting but little deference for his fellows, impatient of restraint or advice when it conflicts with his desires…. A child in his intellectual capacity and manifestations, he has the animal passions of a strong man…. His mind was radically changed, so decidedly that his friends and acquaintances said he was ‘no longer Gage.’”