Chaff: Scientists Identify Brain's 'Hate Circuit'
"Even curmudgeons require some sustenance to keep going"
Posted: 2008-10-29
Scientists Identify Brain's 'Hate Circuit'
By Robert Preidt, Healthday News, 2008-10-29
http://www.healthday.com/Article.asp?AID=620734
We neurocurmudgeons are always saddened when our neuro-colleagues offer grist for the mill and it yields much chaff and little wheat. Even curmudgeons require some sustenance to keep going.
Our latest posting was brought to our attention by one of our "bad neurojournalism" spotters who wondered if reading such pieces were activating our hate circuits. We're not sure. But how annoying it would be to have one's feeling of dislike (dislike is as far as we can go, Neurocurmudgeons are rather gentle at heart) be misinterpreted as evidence of romantic love! We suspect that if we were to be scanned while reading this piece the mix of emotions, such as despair and dislike combined with amusement and astonishment, would yield images providing no insight into our inner thoughts and judgments. We certainly would not want these images used to interpret our actions. We particularly like the free-wheeling explanation provided in the closing paragraphs. Our reward circuit was abuzz. But, we accept not everyone feels the same way. You have your insula, we have ours. After reading the piece The Mill invites you to send in your interpretation of the findings. We think social networking could do wonders for social cognitive neuroscience.
