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A lot of exciting neuroscience was happening in 19th-century England.
在19世纪的英国 兴起了很多激动人心的神经科学方面的研究
Victorian scientists were figuring out that certain parts of our brains are connected
维多利亚时代的科学家们预测说 我们大脑的某些部分
with certain parts of our bodies, like different senses or muscles.
与我们身体的某些部分是相连接的 例如：不同的感觉或肌肉
But mixed in with all the legitimate research was some pseudoscience,
但除了严谨的实验外 还混入了一些伪科学
or misleading ideas that spread without rigorous scientific backing.
或误导概念 那些理论并没有严谨的科学支持
Like one theory from the Viennese physician Franz Joseph Gall,
如维也纳医生弗朗茨·约瑟夫·加尔的理论认为
who thought that character traits, like religiousness or curiosity, were also linked to specific brain regions.
性格特征比如虔诚和好奇心 与大脑的特殊区域有关
This theory became the basis of phrenology,
这一理论后来成为了“颅相学”的基础
a field of study that claimed that you could determine someone's personality by the shape of their skull.
它的一些研究声称 一个人的性格是由他的颅骨形状来决定的
Phrenologists believed that all human brains were made up of many distinct "organs"
颅相学家认为 所有人类的大脑都是由各种不同的“器官”形成的
that could be mapped to various personality traits.
这种“器官”能够映射各种各样的个人性格特点
They claimed the more you used a certain brain region, the bigger it got.
他们声称 如果你经常使用大脑的某个部位 那么该部位就会变大
And the less you used it, the smaller it got — kind of like how muscles work.
若是你不常使用 它就会逐渐变小 这类似于肌肉的原理
And they assumed that the skull conformed to the shape of the brain,
他们认为 颅骨符合大脑的形状
revealing where these bigger and smaller "organs" were.
揭示了不同“器官”的大小
So, theoretically, you could inspect someone's skull,
因此理论上来说 你可以通过检查一个人的头骨
to figure out parts of their personality.
来确定他的部分性格特征
Phrenology became enormously popular in the UK around the early 1800s,
早在1800年代早期 颅相学在英国十分受欢迎
and spread to places like America, France, and Germany.
并且传播到了美国 法国和德国
It was pretty much a load of garbage and guesswork, and many scientists were vocal critics.
颅相学被认为是一堆垃圾和空想 而且受到许多科学家直言不讳的批评
But at the time, there wasn't enough evidence to thoroughly debunk the theory.
但在那个年代 还没有足够的证据来彻底揭穿这个理论
Researchers would've, of course, dissected the brains of dead people,
当然 研究人员解剖了去世的人
not living people, and the human body changes a lot after death.
而非活人的大脑 但人死后身体会发生很多变化
So even if living brains were different shapes, dead brains probably looked pretty much the same.
所以即使活着的大脑有不同的形状 死去的大脑也有可能看起来很相似
Plus, the public thought phrenology was really compelling.
另外 大众认为颅相学确实有吸引力
Just like horoscopes, people tend to love things that tell them something about themselves.
就像星座一样 人们喜欢听能够解释自己的说法
So, phrenology thrived on subjective validation, which is the idea that people tend to believe
颅相学因主观验证而兴盛 因为人们往往愿意相信
in something if it's personally true or meaningful for them.
那些他们主观相信的或者是对他们有意义的事
But as the ideas spread, they started being used to justify race and class inequalities.
但随着这些理论的传播 它们开始被用来证明种族和阶级的不平等
Upper classes used phrenology to reassure themselves that they were supposed to be on top,
上层阶级利用颅相学来解释他们高人一等的原因
because of the ideal shapes of their brains.
是因为他们理想的大脑形状 让自己安心
Lower classes, on the other hand, accepted the pseudoscience
另一方面 下层阶级接受了伪科学
because it claimed that these brain "organs" could be developed,
因为它声称 这些大脑“器官”可以被开发
so they could improve themselves with hard work.
所以他们可以通过艰苦努力来 提高自己
The American physician Samuel Morton made even more sweeping claims about skull shape in his book, Crania Americana.
美国医生塞缪尔·莫顿在他的书《美国头骨》中 更全面详细地阐述了头骨的形状
Morton argued that Caucasians were superior to other races, like Africans and Native Americans,
基于颅骨测量法或不同的头骨和大脑的大小
because of craniometry, or different skull and supposedly brain sizes.
莫顿认为白种人优于其他有色人种 如非洲人和印第安人
Which is just racism under the guise of science.
这就是打着科学幌子的种族主义
Some phrenologists used these ideas to rationalize slavery and colonization,
一些颅相学家利用这些想法来使奴隶制和殖民制度合法化
while others were anti-slavery because they thought these "inferior" races ought to be protected.
而其他一些颅相学家正提倡反对奴隶制 因为他们认为这些“下等”种族需要得到保护
Eventually, all this scientific racism was acknowledged,
最终 所有的这些“科学的”种族主义都被揭穿了
and phrenology's legitimacy took a nosedive in the mid-1800s
而由于我们继续深入研究人脑是如何运作的
as we continued to learn more about how the human brain actually works.
颅相学的合理性在19世纪中期 江河日下
First of all, the brain conforms to the shape of the skull, not the other way around.
首先 是头骨的形状决定大脑的 而不是反过来的
And secondly, the brain doesn't physically grow or shrink like our muscles.
其次 大脑的发育或萎缩在生理上并不和我们的肌肉一样
Phrenologists were also wrong that the brain was made up of discrete chunks —
大脑不是由离散的的大块组成的 这点上颅相学家也错了
it's one organ with a bunch of networked cells.
它是由一个器官连着一群网状般的细胞组成
But there was something to the idea that the brain was spatially organized,
但还有一些别的观点 大脑是一个空间组织
and different regions were linked with different functions — which we call functional specialization.
不同的部位有着不同的作用 我们把它称为功能专用化
The French physician Paul Broca contributed some evidence to support this idea in the 1860s.
法国医生波尔·布洛卡在19世纪60年代提供了一些支持这个观点的 证据
He found that damage to the left frontal lobe in humans was linked to speech impairment,
他发现左额叶损伤与人类与语音障碍有关
without affecting someone's ability to understand what other people were saying.
却不会影响理解别人说的话的能力
In the 1870s, Gustav Fritsch and J. L. Hitzig were experimenting with stimulating different
在19世纪70年代 Gustav Fritsch和J.L.Hitzig在刺激
parts of the cerebral cortex of a dog, which produced movement in different areas of its body.
狗大脑皮层的不同区域时 狗身上产生了不同部位的 运动
Through experiments like these, scientists were able to develop a better understanding
通过这样的实验 到20世纪初 科学家们已经能够对
of different regions of the brain by the start of the 20th century.
大脑不同部位有了更好的理解
Unlike phrenological maps, which assigned arbitrary brain areas to personality traits,
不同于颅相学地图映射的定义任意大脑区域与性格特征相关联
our current brain maps are based on experiments that show different functions of each region.
我们当前的大脑地图是基于实验 它向我们展示了不同区域的不同作用
With the development of technologies like Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Computed Tomography,
随着磁共振成像和计算机断层扫描等科学技术的发展
and the ability to do careful brain surgery, our understanding of neuroscience continues to grow.
以及可以做大脑外科手术的能力 我们对神经科学的理解仍在 继续深入
Nowadays, we're positive that phrenology was junk science.
如今 我们认为颅相学是伪科学
The shape of someone's head doesn't say anything about their personality, character, or moral depth.
一个人头的形状并不能说明他的个性、性格或者道德深度
But we can still see its echoes in language we use today, like "highbrow", "lowbrow" and "well-rounded".
但是我们现在仍在使用一些当时语言遗留下来的词汇 如“知识分子”、“下里巴人”和 “博学的人”
Phrenology may have lacked scientific merit, and was definitely used to justify harmful ideas,
颅相学可能缺少科学价值 被用来证明一些有害的想法
but it did cause scientists to think more critically about how biology is intertwined with thoughts and emotions.
但它确实使科学家在思想和情感角度 更批判性地 思考生物是如何交织在一起的
Thanks for watching this episode of SciShow, brought to you by our patrons on Patreon.
感谢收看这一期由我们的赞助人从Patreon带来的SciShow
How that works, is we ask for your money so that we don't have to charge you. That's the idea of Patreon.
Patreon怎么运作的?就是我们向你们要钱 这样我们就不必收费了 这就是Patreon的思想
Also, we give you acess to a couple of cool things you can check it out at patreon.com/scishow,
同样我们给你接近一些很有意思的东西的机会 你可以随时到Patreon.com/scishow查看
and if you just wanna keep getting smarter with us, it's absolutely free,
如果你想像我们一样越来越聪明的话 那它完全是免费的
just go to youtube.com/scishow and subscribe!
快去youtube.com/scishow订阅吧
