Eric Kandel and the Disordered Mind, Death. Aug 31, 2018, Part 2

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🗓️ 31 August 2018

⏱️ 46 minutes

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Summary

The human brain contains an estimated 100 billion neurons. When those cells malfunction, the disrupted process can lead to schizophrenia, PTSD, and other disorders. In his book The Disordered Mind, Nobel Prize-winning neuropsychiatrist Eric Kandel looks at where the processes fault to give insight into how the brain works. According to Kandel, the understanding of these disorders offers a chance “to see how our individual experiences and behavior are rooted in the interaction of genes and environment that shapes our brains.” Earlier in 2018, Utah became the 15th state to legalize water cremation, or alkaline hydrolysis. Unlike traditional cremation, which burns human remains at 1,400 degrees Fahrenheit, water cremation uses a mixture of water and lye, along with heat and pressure, to break down the remains. Meanwhile, many cemeteries across the country now offer green burial sites—sites that ban embalming fluid and use biodegradable caskets. As climate-conscious consumers consider their final arrangements, alternative funerals like a water cremation or a green burial are becoming more popular in the face of resource-heavy traditional funerals.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Plato. Dr. Eric Candell certainly needs no introduction to
0:06.2	Usai Fry listeners. The 2000 Nobel Prize winner in Physiology or Medicine and co-director
0:12.0	of the Mind Behavior Institute at Columbia University has spent his entire career working to understand
0:18.3	the brain and what makes us whom we are. And he has a new book,
0:22.4	The Disordered Mind, What Unusual Brains Tell Us About Ourselves, and you can read an excerpt of this
0:28.3	incredibly great book. I think it's his best work at our website at Science Friday.com slash
0:33.5	disordered, and Dr. Candell, Eric, is here with us. Welcome back. It's always a pleasure to have you.
0:38.2	It's a pleasure for me to be here.
0:39.9	You know, in this book you examine the brain by watching what happens when things go wrong in the brain, disease and illness. And I was interesting to note in your notes. you say this is an observation that you first made way back in your medical school days and thought
0:54.9	about, gee, you know, this is what I want to know about.
0:58.0	Well, in some ways it's a tradition within neurology that we learn a lot about.
1:04.3	Disorders of brain teaches us about normal function occurs.
1:09.8	So from that point of view, I was influenced very much about the tradition within neurology.
1:16.6	It has not been as characteristic of psychiatry, the field I came from,
1:20.6	but psychiatry and neurology emerging really,
1:24.6	because psychiatry really emerges a discipline originally because
1:31.8	people thought that the mind was different from the brain.
1:35.0	Now we realize that all metal processes are brain processes and that neurology and psychiatry
1:40.6	have many features in common.
1:42.8	In your book you say that as we understand these disorders better, more and more similarities
1:47.9	will emerge.
1:49.3	Absolutely.
	...

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