If there’s one thing I love, its random studies/theories and how I can pick and choose which ones to believe and lead me in self-justifying my pious life. It helps me get to sleep at night.
Some oldies but goodies include 1) the fact that standing next to a road is worse for you than second hand smoke and 2) copy machines can cause chronic conditions and should carry a warning label.
Well my new favorite one is from Neurophysiologist Katherine Rankin at the University of California, San Francisco.
According to Dr. Rankin, if you [don't] get sarcastic tone[s]… you must have some damage to your parahippocampal gyrus which is located in the right brain. People with dementia, or head injuries in that area, often lose the ability to pick up on sarcasm, and so they don’t respond in a socially appropriate ways.
Presumably, this is a pathology, which in turn suggests that sarcasm is part of human nature and probably an evolutionarily good thing
Okay, it may be a stretch for some of you to believe that I’m more evolved than the rest of you, but sarcasm has developed over years, and more specifically the ability to “get it”. If you don’t get it, you might just stare at me slack-jawed, or want to punch me in the face. Well to that I respond, you don’t have dimentia do you? Does your parahippocampal gyrus hurt?
Tags: jimesy, parahippocampal gyrus
June 22, 2008 at 6:14 pm
I don’t get it.
June 22, 2008 at 9:35 pm
Your sarcasm detector may be evolved, but my prehensile tail is still the best thing going!