Question for Geniuses.

[etgryphon]

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I do know he wouldn't play a mean pin-ball, though.


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Dun Dun Da DA DuDA!...

nice...

-Gryph

[Darryl_P]

Does the sense of touch include stuff that goes on inside your body? For example, if I feel stuff happening in my lungs when I breathe, is that the sense of touch working? Or does it only refer to stuff that our skin comes in contact with?

If it's the latter then I'd say yes, otherwise probably not, although I doubt such a person could exist.

[purnell]

My guess is that the infantile mind, never having been stimulated, would not be aware of the concept of aliveness, or anything else.

Another thing that occurred to me is that a fetus with no developing senses might also have a severely underdeveloped brain. Such a fetus, it seems to me, would likely be spontaneously aborted.

He certainly wouldn't be able to feel falling off a high place. Falling off a high place is like driving in a car. There are two things in a car that would tell you you are moving.

1) you would see things moving in your window. so relative to you, your brain would "sense" movement.
2) you would feel the pressure on your back against the chair created as your mass increases slightly.

If you were to fall off a building you would
1) see the world approaching and sense movement
2) feel the friction of the air on your skin

A child born without sight or touch would certainly never fully understand or even sense the idea of movement.

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Does the sense of touch include stuff that goes on inside your body? For example, if I feel stuff happening in my lungs when I breathe, is that the sense of touch working?

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I'm not sure. But I was wondering as well. Could this person "feel" their heart beating? Would their brain acknowledge this beat? It's like when you cover your ears and clamp your teeth together...you can "hear" it internally. Can deaf people hear this? I wonder..

I also do not know if the brain would be able to "dream". Because, I'm assuming, dreams are only composed of past stimuli. Because this baby never had much/any stimuli, I doubt his/her brain would be able to concoct a dream.

As far as the brain feeling hungry, and tired, etc... I don't know. I guess it could feel hunger and exhaustion?

Good discussion so far.

[A_C_Slater]

There is a story from World War One about a American soldier that lost his sight, hearing, arms, and legs from a land mine.

This is about as close as one can get to this state you describe. There is a movie about it, but I forget what it's called. In the movie the soldier eventually tells the doctor's too kill him in morse code, by banging his head against the steel rail of the bed saying "kill me, kill me, kill me" over and over again in the code.


Metallica wrote a song about this movie, it is called "One" from the '...And Justice For All' album.

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the soldier eventually tells the doctor's too kill him in morse code, by banging his head against the steel rail of the bed saying "kill me, kill me, kill me" over and over again in the code.


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Holy shhhhh.it. That's hardcore. I wanna watch that movie. Please let me know if you remember the title.

[A_C_Slater]

I found it.

The movie is called 'Johnny Got His Gun' (1971)

Yahoo user's rated it an A-





A moving drama which realistically depicts the horrors and evil of war. A youthful combatant in the first World War finds himself in a hospital bed with both of his arms and legs amputated. This was also the inspiration for the song "One" by heavy metal legends Metallica.

Genres: Drama

[mostsmooth]

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There is a story from World War One about a American soldier that lost his sight, hearing, arms, and legs from a land mine.

This is about as close as one can get to this state you describe. There is a movie about it, but I forget what it's called. In the movie the soldier eventually tells the doctor's too kill him in morse code, by banging his head against the steel rail of the bed saying "kill me, kill me, kill me" over and over again in the code.


Metallica wrote a song about this movie, it is called "One" from the '...And Justice For All' album.

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why didnt he just tell the docs to kill him? why bang his head in code?

[RJT]

Don80,

This is hilarious. I have been rolling on the floor laughing since this morning.

RJT