FRONTAL BRAIN

Bernell E. Baldwin, Ph. D.

Patricia. Before: a responsible surgical nurse of character and culture who sympathized well with her patients. After: no more responsible nursing. Now she can’t sympathize with her patients and she has lost her ambition. She says, “I don’t care if I make a mistake, it will turn out all right in the end.”

Pauline. Before: “What is the thing to do if you lose a watch you have borrowed from a friend?” Ans: “Tell her I expect I would have to pay for the loss of it.” After: same question. Ans: “Borrow another watch”!

Phineas. Before: well respected foreman with a good job and a father with a happy home. After: He lost his job, lost his love for his wife and family and deserted them for a life of wandering in the West, and South America. His physician, Dr. Harlowe, observed that he became irreverent, irresponsible and irascible. He lost his will power; his values seemed to have crashed. Former friends said that he was “no longer Phineas.”

What happened to these three people? What made the dramatic shift in their personalities and seemed to cut the taproot of their characters? The front of their brains was destroyed. PATRICIA and PAULINE had their brain surgery (frontal lobotomies)* on purpose. PHINEAS’ surgery was faster and much cheaper. He was tamping down blasting powder with a steel bar when the dynamite exploded and shot the tamping bar, like a long bullet, up under his left eye, right through the front of his brain and out the top of his head! You can see Phineas’ famous skull and his crowbar in the medical museum at Harvard Medical School.

What Is So Special About The Front-Brain?

Traditionally, brain scientists have looked at the frontal lobes of the brain structurally. These two lobes extend, one on each side, from the forehead back to the ears and from the eyes up to the top of the head. They contain more than 40% of all the precious cortex (outer layer of the brain) of the whole human brain; the frontal lobe is by far the largest lobe of all lobes of the brain. From a physiological point of view, however, the frontal lobe is connected directly by living wires or nerve fibers to all other major parts of the human brain. This broader physiological system we will call the FRONT-BRAIN.

The Front-Brain is the last to be developed. The cortex of the frontal lobes of children is not completed until they are 10 years old, but the “insulating” of the “wires” on the inside is not complete until a person is about 30 years old. Then it takes a lifetime to finish the synapses (connections) that work together to make each one of us a unique person, - like no one else in the universe!

Of all the parts of the brain, the Front-Brain is the most sensitive, being very vulnerable to poisons, oxygen deficiency, strokes and just plain old neglect. This portion of the brain has thousands of the biggest nerve cells of the whole brain - some are almost a yard long! It also has millions of some of the very tiniest cells of the whole brain; these tell the big cells what to do and what not to do.

The electronic connections of the Front-Brain system are made not just in series, flashing from point one to point two and then to three, but in parallel like the best of computers. This provides for simultaneous processing of myriads of messages. Not only is it supreme in the breadth of its connections, but also in the type, arrangement and power of those connections to other parts of the brain. This structure of unique anatomical character permits the healthy Front-Brain to become not just a cog, a gear or even the steering wheel, but the driver, the front seat driver of the whole brain and subsequently of the whole life.

How Does The Front-Brain Work?

Let’s say you are driving the family on a two lane road over the mountains to a fine lake. Your eyes report to your Front-Brain, “There is a big truck just ahead!” Memory storage banks in the back of your brain remind you about passing trucks in the past. Your ears report, “That big truck is laboring hard.” The bottom of the brain almost yells “Pass ‘em!” The eyes report, “Crest of steep hill just ahead.” The bottom rejoins, “See…plenty of room.” The Front-Brain affirms, “We’ll drive defensively.” The back of the brain argues, “You are only going 50.” The bottom yells (electronically of course), “Mash it!” The Front-Brain orders, “Quiet - we shall wait, then pass.” The eyes shout, “There comes a new Lazer going 80!” The ears report, “WOOoosh…! The eyes signal, “Now we are over the hill - all clear.” The Front-Brain orders, “Pass in confidence!” The ears report, “Oh, Daddy we could have smashed. We could be dead.” Mother’s voice says, “I like your driving.”

The Front-Brain says, “I love you too much to take chances like that.” The bottom brain whispers electronically, “Wrong again. I should mind my own business.” The Front-Brain says, “We should be at the lake soon.” Everybody is peaceful and happy to be alive.

Top Management

A leading brain scientist of Russia, Dr. Luria, in his book, The Working Brain, called the frontal lobes “superstructures above all other parts of the cerebral cortex so that they perform a more universal function of general regulation of behavior.” He also pointed out the frontal lobes are important for self-control - loss of large portions of the frontal lobes is associated with violent emotional outbursts and changes of character. Incidentally, Russia outlawed frontal lobe surgery years ago.

Personality

An entire book has been written on Personality and the Frontal Lobes by Dr. Asenath Petrie. Using a battery of special tests, she conducted a five-year study on patients who had been lobotomized. Upon receiving a letter, one of her patients said, “I don’t like writing letters anymore; I like receiving them and not answering them.” Another patient volunteered, “It (the lobotomy) changed me. I don’t want to work so hard at home.”

She found that afterwards the patients were less tactful, they were more abrupt in their manners, they were less critical of self, less concerned with their achievements, less concerned about everything: their reactions to stress were lessened, their interests, happiness (such as it was) and their thoughts were mainly focused on themselves in the here-and-now. Accuracy in mental and even manual tasks was decreased. Mental endurance went down. During a goal-directed task they were highly distractible. When given common proverbs to interpret they missed the point on many. The capacity to see beyond the concrete, the close, the here-and-now, the obvious, to go beyond to grasp the rich symbolic meaning of a proverb, they had lost. Conventional IQ’s also were cut down, especially in people having superior intelligence. There were less feelings of guilt on the one hand and more satisfaction with self and self-performance on the other.

Dr. Petrie also documented a marked increase in preference for sex humor after the then popular brain surgery. She then concluded, “…the individual shows a dramatic ability…his standards have dropped.”

The sister of a famous brain surgeon, an excellent cook, was given a lobotomy in Canada. After her lobotomy she remembered how to cook alright, but had lost the capacity to plan and prepare a meal alone.

After frontal lobe surgery another lady finally tried to write to her husband who was serving in the Canadian troops. “How are you? How are you? How are you?...” An entire page was filled with the same words, “How are you?” This problem, called “perseveration,” is a real and important feature of frontal lobe impairment.

Appetite Control

When 128 patients with brain tumors of the Ochsner clinic were studied, researchers discovered that 70% of those having tumors of the frontal lobes clearly showed psychiatric symptoms. One 48-year-old business man neglected his work, doing practically nothing all day but reading the newspaper, chatting with his wife and eating, he would even take food right off the plates of his family by force. Although irritable and sensitive about these developments, he gained about 100 pounds in one year! His untrue stories also caused problems. Special E-rays found in his right frontal lobe a tumor which was later confirmed at surgery.

Intelligence

Though ordinary IQ scores are not cut down as much by similar defects in the frontal area as they are by lesions in the back of the brain, the capacity for wisdom, the ability to use knowledge in appropriate planning and to make higher level generalizations does involve the Front-Brain.

Higher Vision

Mature, effective people have hindsight to profit from life-experience and history of the past, insight to see deeply in the present and foresight to see the outcomes in the future of current trends. Without the frontal lobes all this is almost irrelevant.

Dr. Rylander, as professor of Forensic Psychiatry of the Royal Caroline Institute at Stockholm, Sweden, went the second mile in testing lobotomy patients. He wasn’t satisfied with routine psychologic testing that tended to magnify things small and belittle things great. He personally worked with these people and even arranged to have some of them live with him or interact with him personally over an extended period of time after their lobotomies. The wife of one his patients, a school teacher, said, “I have lost my husband. I’m alone. I must take over all responsibility now.” The mother of another patient declared, “She is my daughter, but yet a different person. She is with me in the body but her soul is in some way lost. Those deep feelings, the tenderness, are gone. She is hard somehow.” One wife spoke frankly of her husband’s behavior after lobotomy: “His soul appears to be destroyed.” After surgery, his patients could feel neither real happiness nor deep sorrow. Dr. Rylander concluded, “Something has died within them.”

Ways To Harm, Handicap or Destroy The Front-Brain

The Classical Deep Lobotomy

This operation, originating in Portugal by Dr. Moniz, permanently tranquilizes the brain and destroys the spiritual and highest mental functions. The white matter, or the living “wires” connecting the front of the brain with the middle of the brain, are cut or destroyed. By 1950, about 20,000 men, women, prisoners and even children had been lobotomized. Psychosurgery became a fad. Incidentally, Moniz himself was shot in the spine by one of his own lobotomized patients. Surgeons are still cutting and shocking, burning and radiating the front of the brain by destroying part of the best of it. We are of course not referring to the rational use of surgery for brain tumors, accidents and a host of other legitimate and scientifically acceptable operations on this most complicated of all body systems.

Fortunately, wiser and far more cautious brain surgeons are cutting far less often and far less tissue these days. Why then the emphasis on lobotomy in this article? The answer is simple: the facts given here dramatize the functions of the Front-Brain.

We hope the current very conservative trend in psychosurgery continues until the crude cutting and burning for mind cures ceases all together. But meanwhile psychosurgery is still being used in the United States, England, Germany, Japan and elsewhere for such things as depression, overeating and crimes of various kinds including sex offenses, violent behaviors, assaultiveness, drug addiction and others. Two hundred and seventy five articles were published on psychosurgery in less than two and a half years. And the activity in this area continues.

Sports

We live in a very mobile and violent world with the result that Front-Brain injuries are far too frequent. But boxing is different. The brain is assaulted on purpose and regularly, for “fun!” Tiny hemorrhages are frequently produced by common boxing; this kills many brain cells which can never be replaced during this life. Knocking people senseless as a goal in sports is not only senseless in itself, but highly destructive to the most significant part of the body. No wonder more and more physicians and those in the know are blowing a whistle on this pseudosport.

Chemical Lobotomy

There are several far more sophisticated ways of destroying the Front-Brain than by knives. Chemicals can do it too. Beverage alcohol gives a fast lobotomy. It’s cheap, it’s common, it’s popular and it’s temporary, - almost. The “quick-fix tranquilization” from a few drinks is just what millions like. After the hangover they imagine that they are “OK”. But alcohol cuts down protein formation in the brain and produces chemical damage to its membranes and synapses. More than this, the frontal lobe nerve cells are so tiny that they can’t resist alcohol’s chemical thrust. Results? Dead nerve cells abound in the Front-Brain after heavy drinking. This changes the personality and the character very gradually until we (the family, the community, the company) have a problem on our hands. Many men and increasingly more women have impending frontal lobe deficiency! This problem usually is handled only superficially, and soon more alcohol is taken. Much drinking behavior is episodic, that is, it occurs in bouts. All too often the resultant behavioral and neural disease proceeds until the person, and often the family and the career, are threatened, handicapped, and then destroyed. The alcohol-lobotomy is permanent! Presidents, kings, TV personalities, mothers, it makes no difference. Alcohol is a frontal lobe poison and should be outlawed. If America does not awaken to the potential danger and act fast we are doomed to become a nation drunk—etched into the pages of history.

Drug Lobotomies

It used to take big bottles to “drown a person’s sorrow.” Now we have little bottles full of tranquilizers. Some leading physicians are warning us that tranquilizers, the most common prescription drugs in America, are far over-prescribed. Millions are taking tranquilizers and other brain drugs too much, too often and for the wrong reasons. We are building a drug culture not just in the ghetto but in the most affluent suburbs. Our whole society is becoming chemicalized. The “quick-fix” is becoming an accepted pattern of living. We condemn, arrest and even imprison the lower classes for their drugs but consider our “respectable” drugs OK. This hypocrisy is unwise. It widens the generation gap. It alienates the rich from the poor. It demoralizes the medical profession and erodes the structure of society.

Americans are quick to produce something that people will pay for. When reserpine came along from India, we swallowed it then imitated it in our giant drug factories. Later we learned that reserpine is bad news indeed for the brain. Yes, it tranquilizes. Yes, it gives temporary relief. But too often, after many of these brain drugs are stopped, the destruction of parts of the brain becomes manifest. The poor, tranquilized person falls into Parkinsonism, shaking and halting through the rest of his life, unless these symptoms are covered up by another camouflaging drug or two. These additional drugs, incidentally, have their own sneaky side effects also, like dulling the brain.

Marijuana, LSD And Beyond

It is not widely known, but heavy, steady users of marijuana and other street drugs get more and more water in the ventricles (symmetrical cavities inside the brain). What happens? The marijuana user’s brain cells die one by one, as in alcoholism, until in order to keep the skull full, water is used to fill up these ventricular spaces. Normally the ventricles are trim, symmetrical and balanced, permitting circulation of fluid for exchange of nutrients with chemicals produced by the brain. After heavy use of the big weed, marijuana, the ventricles become larger and larger. This fact opens interesting prospects. The time may come when the brain will be X-rayed, or possibly even scanned by computer-controlled machines, before the best jobs are filled.

Lobotomy By Strangulation

We have discussed creeping lobotomy by older and newer chemicals. Now we touch on how to be lobotomized in private, gradually, by strangulation. No, not by ropes in the garage, not by a nylon stocking or even by big hands. It can be done easily by silverware! Here is how. Eat like the Jones’. Then in the black of night the arteries to your frontal lobes can gradually plug up with cholesterol, fat and clots. You can hasten this quiet, prevalent process markedly by building up your blood pressure. After some years of this conventional living, your personality, your wits, your keenest intellect will silently steal away.

Strokes And The Front-Bran

One of the most common brain sites attacked by strokes is the frontal lobe. Visit a rest home and look around briefly. The deplorable state of once-productive people is evident. The fashionable living which contributed to their strokes does not end so fashionably.

Lobotomy By Neglect

This is touchy. Formerly the brain has been considered to be a “black box,”* static and stable. It is not. The brain is made up of living cells. They breathe what gasses they can get from the blood. They eat what food they can get from the blood. They exist, work and wither or thrive depending on how we take care of ourselves. We now know that any nerve cell that is not used withers. Then it dies - dead. Just as dead as if a bullet or a bottle did it. The LAW OF ATROPHY OF DISUSE is tremendously significant. It says that if we neglect the frontal lobe, never really giving it adequate, worthy input, never activating it in problem-solving “through-put” or never challenging it in whole-hearted output, we are asking for creeping atrophy of disuse which can result in lobotomy by neglect.

Nutrition And The Front-Brain

Starving the brain is uncommon, even difficult. But it can be done. Severe protracted deficiency of food in a pregnant woman can produce permanent brain deficits in the baby she is carrying. We must take a broader view of nutrition. What goes into the mouth is important but it is not the whole story. The ultimate diet is the nutrition available to the cells. The micro-diet bathing the frontal lobe nerve cells is crucial. Vitamin, mineral, protein or glucose deficiency can all compromise the quality of human behavior.

The “cellular diet” can also be markedly altered by the hormones as well as by the health or disease states of other organs of the body. Even such a common thing as constipation can release amino acid break-down products into the blood and dull the brightness of the brain.

Tobacco-smoking mothers can starve the nerve cells of their babies to such an extent as to produce permanent deficits not only in brain size but in brain performance. This is probably through a combination of the toxic effects of smoking, from such well-known poisons as carbon monoxide and nicotine. The carcinogens of tobacco DNA may also tie up the DNA of the babies’ brains and thus interfere with brain growth. The stunting of tobacco on growing organisms is well known.

Implications

The brain is the government, or capital, of the body. We, the “body politic”, can put in dynamic dictators, dignified and often stuffy kings, impatient revolutionaries, ivory tower theorists, or even pleasure-loving populists. We can shoot the Lincolns and put in the Hitlers. We can stride into truth, beauty, and freedom or slide all greased with apathy into deception and Orwellian slavery. Each choice is a step, each minute an input. It rests with every one of us, through the activity of the Front-Brain, to determine who and what will control us, - truth or error, good or evil.

Unfortunately, many universities starve the frontal lobe and their typical academic offerings are grossly imbalanced. Great principles are ignored or buried under reams of trivia crammed down mental stomachs year after year. Result? The Decline and Fall of the Great American Front-Brain.

Far too many churches are merely comfortable couches for the soul. Why? Because truth is so smoothly sweetened with devitaminized, demineralized platitudes, so adulterated, so spiked with tradition and human guess work that it tranquilizes the Front-Brain and placates the back-brain. The bottom-brain tends to run the show in the megapolis, in government and in society. What then, are the mega-trends for the “Big Network?” Society is deteriorating rapidly into a Babylon of confusion.

How To Help Build The Front-Brain

Fortunately there are a number of things we can do to promote the health and most effective function of our Front-Brain. We need to see its importance as the very heart of our personality, temperament and character. We need to understand that the brain is plastic (can be molded) and we can help or hurt it by many “little things” we do.

Protect It From Injury

Use seat belts or harnesses to protect your skull from cracking against the dashboard like the shell of a huge egg. Many head injuries can be prevented. Safety is not weakness; it is good sense. When working, driving and enjoying recreational activities, remember that egg on your shoulders!

Give It Good Blood

To make good blood we need good food. Whole grains provide complex carbohydrates for steady blood sugar, and vitamin E and the B vitamins for making brain hormones in the frontal lobe. Fruits and vegetables also provide those vitamins and minerals so essential for good brain function. Variety is important. Eating too much and at irregular times, especially late at night, is hard on the stomach and digestive system. This tends to produce indigestion and fermentation, which results in absorption of undesirable breakdown chemicals into the blood and their transport to the brain. These products often interfere with the brain function.

General good health of the whole body helps make good blood. Clean fresh air and deep breathing help deliver oxygen to the brain while stale air tends to make stale thinking.

Give It Pure Blood

Almost everyone knows about adequacy, but purity of nutrition is also vital. Eating from second-hand sources, from way down the food chain, puts more by-products into the blood. These wastes from animal fats and animal proteins can burden the brain neurochemically, especially when combined with skimping on the water-drinking and exercise needed to dilute, wash out or burn up excesses or impurities.

Support It With Good Circulation

Blood goes where the action is; where there is no real need the circulation tends to be sluggish or depressed. All faculties and functions of the body need a regular workout. Brisk walks, especially in the morning, are a splendid way to prevent headaches, so often caused by unrelieved brain work under stress while breathing mediocre air. Who can think effectively with a headache? We recommend “exercise breaks” instead of the usual caffeine break. Your nerves will gain poise and power instead of irritability and tremors.

Atherosclerosis and hypertension, which interfere with circulation, must be prevented or controlled.

Give It Rest

Your brain contains myriads of tiny batteries; these need “charging” up. Nerve cells communicate with each other chemically and electronically. When a brain cell is too tired it can’t produce brain hormones to get anything done electronically. When this happens, the personal computers of your Front-Brain have “Brown-out.” What can you do? Fatigue is okay but impairment is destructive. We need moderation in work and regular deep, peaceful sleep. Granted, the back and bottom of the brain can bark orders and make noise - even make waves - in the office, but it takes the Front-Brain to come up with WISDOM. It needs quality sleep. Fortified by early morning inspiration time, it will be poised for a successful day. Occasional long weekends and a genuine vacation yearly help tremendously to pull and keep your master “control-center” out of a rut.

Feed It Right

If we want to build the best into our Front-Brain it is necessary to give it the best “food” for input. This has never been easier than now. Centuries of information, skill, science and art have provided “nutrition” that has been tested, pruned and proven. It is available for the eating. This special “brain food” must have power to build up the highest functions of the brain without sabotaging the back or the bottom, without ruinous hidden poisons or chemicals. It must have all the best vitamins and minerals, or the “backbone” of the brain will go weak, crooked or even broken. Even trace minerals can be important. This valuable food can’t be greasy with too much popular fat and all sugared up like junk food. This nourishment for the Front-Brain must be eaten often, chewed seriously and swallowed with relish. What is this marvelous bread for the brain? It is the pure, unadulterated, beautiful, powerful spectrum of TRUTH, - scientific, historical and spiritual.

Use It

Even astronauts that sit too long in a weightless condition have an insidious problem - their bones atrophy, the minerals leach right out. Without any mechanical stress all our bones would get progressively weaker until finally even walking would be impossible.

THINK! It may look trite on older desks but there is a lot to it. More and more we need real men and women who THINK. This is the job of the Front Brain. If we don’t use it, we will lose it, for it thrives on real challenge, on problem-solving where the stakes are high and the outcomes are important to individuals, families, communities, societies and to our destiny. Build a climate where real problem solving is more fun, more fulfilling and even exciting than boyish sports. Genuine success is a science.

The WILL is located in the Front-Brain. Use it. One of the best ways is real old-fashioned WORK. We saw, chop, carry and haul our wood, making the most out of this productive, money-saving activity. Then we sit around our Franklin stove enjoying the warmth. It even seems to help our conversation. What are we saying? Serious, motivated work builds WILL POWER. Every rail Abraham Lincoln split tended to build will power and character. Young America urgently needs plenty of physical work for quality of character.

Service is vital to the Front-Brain. For its maximum usefulness and growth, altruistic motivation is essential. It is not just an ego machine. Unselfishness, thinking, planning and working for the good of others are part of its role. We all need more faith and courage, more hope and enthusiasm, friendliness and love. These motives and principles of life’s endeavors can create enduring circuits that tie the whole brain together electronically into a computer net that is fantastic. Our future need not be nuclear oblivion. We can grow in truth, in service, in life. Excellence, even greatness, is attainable, enjoyable, and fulfilling.

Enjoy It!

When the entire person is on a complete program for growth, service and success, fine things result. When we are absorbed in helping others or in promoting the best for the family, the team, the corporation or even the nation, happiness often steals up on us unexpectedly. The Great Designer seems to arrange our sowing to lead to the joys of reaping according to dependable laws. Start now by investing in the finest computer corporation around, - your very own Front-Brain.

References:

1. Blakemore, C., Mechanics of the Mind, Cambridge University Press, London, p 1-8, 1977.
2. Brickner, R.M., The Intellectual Functions of the frontal Lobes, Mac Millan Co., New York, pp 47-48, 1963.
3. Fulton, J.F., ed, The Frontal Lobes, Hafner Publishing Company, Inc. New York, 1948.
4. Konorski, J., Teuber, H.L. and Zernicki, B., The Frontal Granular Cortex and Behavior, Polish Scientific Publishers, Warszwa, 1972.
5. Lhermitte, F., ‘Utilization Behaviour’ and it’s Relation to Lesions of the Frontal Lobes, Brain, 106:237-255, 1983.
6. Luria, A.R., The Working Brain, Basic Books, Inc., New York, 1973.
7. Mark, V.H. and. Ervin, F.R., Violence and the Brain, Harper & Row, New York, pp. 142,143, 1970.
8. Massey, E.W. and Coffey, C.E., Frontal Lobe Personality Syndromes. Postgrad. Med, 73:99-106, 1983.
9. Meyer, A., The Frontal Lobe Syndrome, the Aphasias and Related Conditions, Brain, 97:565-600, 1974.
10. Nauta, W.J.H., Some Efferent Connections of the Prefrontal Cortex in the Monkey. Ch. 19 in The Frontal Granular Cortex and Behavior, Warren and Akert, eds., McGraw Hill Book Co., New York, pp.397-409, 1964.
11. Petrie, A., Personality and the Frontal Lobes, The Blakiston Co., New York, 1952.
12. Rylander, G., Personality Analysis Before and After Frontal Lobotomy. The Frontal Lobes, Hafner Publishing Co., New York, 1966.
13. Soniat, T.L.L., Psychiatric Symptoms Associated with Intracranial Neoplams. Amer. J. Psychiat, 108:19-22, 1951.
14. Talbert, O.R. and Youmans, J.R., Neurological Surgery, vol. 1, 2nd ed., W.B. Saunders Co. Phil., p.13,14, 1982.
15. Weinberger, D.R., Luchins, D.J., Morihisa, J., et al., Asymmetrical Volumnes of the Right and Left Frontal and Occipital Regions of the Human Brain. Ann. Neurol, 11:97-100, 1982.
16. Werner, G., Higher Functions of the Nervous System in Medical Phyisology, V.B. Mountcastle, ed., C.V. Mosby Co., St. Louis, pp. 637, 638, 1980.