"Peter Douglas Zohrab" <zohrab at xtra.co.nz> wrote in message news:<4HvV8.4102$7G4.658649 at news.xtra.co.nz>...
> Hi,
>> I'm not a scientist or medical man, but I've recently sent the following
> email to Dr. Sandra F. Witelson (witelson at mcmaster.ca), of the Department of
> Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience. She hasn't really had time to read
> it and respond to it, but I heard her or Debra L. Kigar in a radio interview
> once, and I wasn't impressed with the apparent reluctance to follow a train
> of thought in a direction which led to un-Feminist conclusions, so I'm
> posting it here, as well. I also have some experience of academics omitting
> to answer my awkward questions !
>> "On page http://www.bioquant.com/gallery/einstein.html you write, " In this
> same region, Einstein's brain was 15% wider than controls. These two
> features suggest that, in Einstein's brain, extensive development of the
> posterior parietal lobes occurred early, in both longitudinal and breadth
> dimensions...."
>> You also state, "the findings do suggest that variation in specific
> cognitive functions may be associated with the structure of the brain
> regions mediating those functions."
>> and later you write, "Einstein's brain weight was not different from that of
> controls, clearly indicating that a large (heavy) brain is not a necessary
> condition for exceptional intellect. " I wonder, however, if that isn't a
> bit misleading -- in other words, is that the sole, or main conclusion that
> emerges from the facts ?
>> Your use of the words "15% wider" clearly refers to size, rather than
> structure, so we are obviously talking about size as well as structure here.
> So you are saying that the size of a particular part of the brain may be
> correlated with enhancement in a particular form of intelligence. So, given
> that you are only interested in differences > or = to 2 SD's from the
> control mean (males with an IQ of 116), we must assume that this increase in
> the *size* of one part of Einstein's brain was either at the expense of the
> size of another part of his brain, or was not enough to push his otherwise
> average/small brain to 2SD's larger than the mean of your controls.
Hello, I don't know what state you went to middle school in, but in my
school we had reading comprehension classes. Perhaps they didn't in
yours, so I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you
have, truly, moved past a middle school level of education.
The article clearly states the the increase in one area was at the
expense of another. I quote:
"These two features suggest that, in Einstein's brain, extensive
development of the posterior parietal lobes occurred early, in both
longitudinal and breadth dimensions, thereby constraining the
posterior expansion of the Sylvian fissure and the development of the
parietal operculum, but resulting in a larger expanse of the inferior
parietal lobe."
