The Skulls They Are A Changin'

Pig Headed or Big Headed?

In two prior posts Dredd Blog noted some areas within some of the U.S. Educational Systems which were areas that are in need of improvement (see The Failure of Applied American Epistemology, and Agnotology: The Surge).

Yes, there may be problems there, but every problem has a solution doesn't it?

One problem may be that new research information, which is potentially related to research in another discipline, may not be automatically shared with researchers in other disciplines, even though it may in fact bolster their research.

That is, a scientist doing microbiology research may not share that research with scientists who are doing psychology research, for example, because everyone is quite busy, naturally doing their own, focused research.

Thus, the question came to my mind, "why isn't there a discipline, perhaps within the work of Librarians, which attempts to classify information between or among various disciplines?"

Let's compare some information in several disciplines, which seems to have some overlap or linkage, so as to question whether or not this hypothetical sharing of relevant information would be beneficial.

A paper and presentation was recently given which documented the change in shape and size of the skulls of certain Caucasian Americans:

The American population has experienced remarkable change in cranial morphology. Some of these have already been documented, but this paper expands on previous results by increasing the time frame, sample sizes and attempting to identify points in time when change begins, or proceeds most rapidly, which in turn may provide clues to reasons for the changes.

(Abstract: Cranial change in America: 1815 to 1980, Richard L. Jantz, Lee M. Jantz, Anthropology, University of Tennessee, emphasis added; Program of the 81st Annual Meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists, page 174-75; see also Tennessee Today; The Remarkable Change in Euro-American Cranial Shape and Size).

Another recent area of research, which may be linked to the skull-size research, is the discovery that symbiont microbes work to develop the human brain:

Microbes may indeed be subtly changing our brain early on — and for what purposes we cannot yet say ... the mere fact that microorganisms can shape our minds brings up many more questions about how humans develop their identity ... these findings call for a complete re-examination of human physiology and immunology. Attributes that were assumed to be human traits have been shown to result from human–microbe interactions.

(The Human Microbiome Congress, emphasis added). Another researcher informs us that current American concepts of reason originated in the 18th Century (The Etiology of Social Dementia, video at end of post), and in another place that researcher informs us:

Probably 98 percent of your reasoning is unconscious - what your brain is doing behind the scenes. Reason is inherently emotional. You can't even choose a goal, much less form a plan and carry it out, without a sense that it will satisfy you, not dis­gust you. Fear and anxiety will affect your plans and your ac­tions. You act differently, and plan differently, out of hope and joy than out of fear and anxiety.

Thought is physical. Learning requires a physical brain change: Receptors for neurotransmitters change at the synapses, which changes neural circuitry. Since thinking is the activation of such circuitry, somewhat different thinking re­quires a somewhat different brain. Brains change as you use them-even unconsciously. It's as if your car changed as you drove it, say from a stick shift gradually to an automatic.

(The Toxic Bridge To Everywhere, emphasis added). If all this research (i.e. head shape/size change, microbes shaping our brain, thoughts changing the brain) came together in one place, it might be sensible to hypothesize that when the brain changes in size and or shape, often so must the cranium, the skull.

Economy of Cygnus

But, let's not forget that it would be wise for those Tennessee skull researchers to also find out if those 1,500 skulls they studied were the skulls of economists (Economists - Aliens From Cygnus?).

Outer space may not be the only sphere where aliens exist, because there is mounting evidence that there could be some here in inner space too.

Since American economists have been telling us about an economy that does not exist here in the U.S.eh? any longer, we now need for them to get real and begin to talk about the Plutonomy that replaced the economy here, rather than the American Dream economy, which is now known to be something that is science fiction.

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The Times They Are A Changin', Bob Dylan

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