The New Phrenology

So I finally started watching the new TED talks, and this one in particular caught me, not only because of it's content, but more what he seemed to describe in passing. Check it out if you want:

http://www.ted.com/talks/jim_fallon_exploring_the_mind_of_a_killer.html

In this video, Dr.Fallon describes how there are actually physical differences and a specific sequence of events that can create a serial killer. To start off, there are a set of genes that can produce a homocidal psychopath, but like most genes they lie dormant until activated. These genes are apparently activated by witnessing repeated violent trauma (he references mirror neurons, briefly), and when activated they can cause a very specific brain damage, something that you can actually see on a PET that distinguishes the brains of normal, non serial killing folk.

That's really interesting! Not just the fact that they've found a physical distinction between serial killers and non, but the fact that they can prove any distinction at all! It's almost a throwback to phrenology, we're getting to the point in our scientific understanding of the mind that we can actually look at the brain and see exactly what someone's personality traits are. And this is just one project that happened to make it to the popular circuit. There is already so much research being done in this field, and their discoveries will only grow in importance as the fields of genetics, psychology, and neurology continue to develop and work together, just imagine what could be next. What if you can look at someone's brain, and read someone's genes, and see not just major flaws like a predisposition for killing people but rather subtle things. Character strengths and flaws, our personality. Somewhere combined between our brain and our DNA is written everything about us, and provides insight into everything we can grow into, it could only be a matter of time before neuroscientists decipher it.

Just imagine what this could mean for our future. Parents could look at their kids' genes and not only know whether or not they will be beautiful or powerful, like we worry about now, but they will be able to pinpoint specific gifts and flaws. We can know whether or not a kid has a potential to be an amazing musician, or a brilliant scientist, or a depressed slacker. None of these genetic signs are definitive, due to the trigger system of our DNA most of what we can unveil is just potential, but that wont matter. Parents will have a new paranoia of exposing their kids to that certain, genetic trigger that will cause that special brain damage which will make their kid unsuccessful in love and life. New schools of parenting will develop specifically designed to target your kids most powerful genes so your child can grow up to be genetically optimal. You could know before your kid ever said his first words exactly how you wanted to raise him and what profession he would excel and enjoy.

Who knows, this is a pretty big leap to make from just that one video, maybe the brain will always be too mysterious to garner anything that useful from. It's kind of unnerving to think that through science we can see and tweak all those parts of our selves that we like to think of as innate, as being part of our soul. But if there's one lesson to be learned from hundreds of years of scientific progress, it's that very few conventional limits haven't been broken by years of thought and experiments. Even if you don't believe that it's possible, it's at least neat to think about.