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Est: June 2013.
Synesthesia
Synesthesia is a fascinating neurological condition that causes an individual (proudly called a synesthete) to experience perceptual information through a sense modality that is unlinked to its source. This is a fancy way of saying that synesthetes may hear colors, smell noises, taste shapes, and even feel flavors. This experience is both involuntary and stable over time. Around 100 different types of synesthesia have been documented, and the condition affects nearly four percent of the general population. Synesthesia is thought to be an inherited trait affecting areas of the brain that communicate sensory information to one another.
Scientific milestones
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, synesthesia enjoyed a flurry of scientific study, mostly descriptive. By the mid-20th century, however, synesthesia had fallen off scientists’ radar, a casualty of the behaviorism movement. The phenomenon began to resurface as a subject of psychological inquiry beginning in the 1970s, stimulated largely by the work of two scientists.
In 1975, Yale University psychologist Larry Marks, PhD, authored a review of the early history of synesthesia research in the journal Psychological Bulletin (Vol. 82, No. 3), the first major psychological treatment of the subject after a 30-year drought. Then, in the early 1980s, neurologist Richard E. Cytowic, MD, published several case reports of synesthesia. He proposed, provocatively, that the condition’s cause rests in the limbic system, a more emotional and “primitive” part of the brain than the neocortex, where higher order thinking occurs. Although that theory has not received widespread support, Cytowic’s case studies and his popular 1993 book, “The Man Who Tasted Shapes,” heightened synesthesia’s prominence and prompted psychologists and neuroscientists to examine the condition experimentally.
In 1987, a team led by Baron-Cohen found the first hard evidence that synesthetes’ experiences are consistent across time. The researchers asked a synesthete to describe the color that each of 100 words triggered. A year later, they repeated the test without warning and found that the associations between words and colors that their subject described were consistent with her initial responses more than 90 percent of the time. In contrast, people without synesthesia, asked to perform the same task but with only a two-week interval between the two tests, were consistent only 20 percent of the time.
In later research, Baron-Cohen’s group established that synesthesia is not only consistent across time but also concretely measurable in the brain. Using positron-emission tomography and functional magnetic resonance imaging, the researchers have found that for synesthetes who report colored hearing, visual areas of the brain show increased activation in response to sound. That isn’t the case for nonsynesthetes.
Other studies have demonstrated that synesthetic perception occurs involuntarily and interferes with ordinary perception. And last summer, University of Waterloo researchers Mike Dixon, PhD, Daniel Smilek, Cera Cudahy and Philip Merikle, PhD, showed that, for one synesthete, the color experiences associated with digits could be induced even if the digits themselves were never presented. These researchers presented a synesthete with simple arithmetic problems such as “5 + 2.” Their experiment showed that solving this arithmetic problem activated the concept of 7, leading their synesthete to perceive the color associated with 7.
This finding, published last July in the journal Nature (Vol. 406), was, according to Dixon, the first objective evidence that synesthetic experiences could be elicited by activating only the concepts of digits. As such, these results suggest that, at least for this synesthete, the color experiences were associated with the digit’s meaning, not just its form.
Together, the evidence shows that “something is going on in the sensory areas of the brain,” concludes Christopher Lovelace, PhD, a research fellow at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. “What we have to do now is try to figure out how the brain does it.”
Neural basis of synesthesia:
Cross-activation
Since regions involved in the identification of letters and numbers lie adjacent to a region involved in color-processing (V4), the additional experience of seeing colors when looking at graphemes might be due to “cross-activation” of V4 (Ramachandran & Hubbard 2001). This cross-activation may arise due to a failure of the normal developmental process of pruning, which is one of the key mechanisms of synaptic plasticity, in which connections between brain regions are partially eliminated with development. Similarly, lexical → gustatory synesthesia may be due to increased connectivity between adject regions of the insula in the depths of the lateral sulcus involved in taste processing that lie adjacent to temporal lobe regions involved in auditory processing. Similarly, taste → touch synesthesia may arise from connections between gustatory regions and regions of the somatosensory system involved in processing touch. However, not all forms of synesthesia are easily explained by adjacency.
Disinhibited feedback
Alternatively, synesthesia may arise through “disinhibited feedback” or a reduction in the amount of inhibition along feedback pathways (Grossenbacher & Lovelace 2001). It is well established that information not only travels from the primary sensory areas to association areas such as the parietal lobe or the limbic system, but also travels back in the opposite direction, from “higher order” cortical regions to early sensory areas. Normally, the balance of excitation and inhibition are maintained. However, if this feedback were not adequately inhibited, then signals coming from later stages of processing might influence earlier stages of processing, such that tones would activate visual cortical areas in synesthetes more than in non-synesthetes. In this case, it might be possible to temporarily have synesthetic experiences after taking drugs like LSD or mescaline. Indeed, some psychedelic drug users report synesthesia-like experiences, although the exact degree of similarity between these drug induced experiences and congenital synesthesia is still unclear (Luke & Terhune 2013).
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themedicalstate posted this A truly well-tailored person suit must be worn with panache.
Expedit esse deos, et, ut expedit, esse putemus.
Nomenque erit indelebile nostrum.
Nec species sua cuique manet, rerumque novatrix ex aliis alias reparat natura figuras: nec perit in toto quicquam, mihi credite, mundo, sed variat faciemque novat, nascique vocatur incipere esse aliud, quam quod fuit ante, morique desinere illud idem. cum sint huc forsitan illa, haec translata illuc, summa tamen omnia constant.
The default is NBC canon; fleshing out the details will take place, as needed, in each individual thread. Hannibal is fluid, and his concept of truth & history is abstract, to say the least. No truth is immutable. No lie is wholly without backing. I tend to use Harris for more thorough fleshing out, but overlay NBC canon where Harris was just too cracky.
There was a cliff; there was a fall. And where, indeed, did the physical remnants drift to?
One could argue about Hannibal's psychology; he certainly expresses traits common to psychopathy and sociopathy (both loaded terms with their own historical biases) but does not neatly fit into any category. He is articulate, polite, charming, and disarming. A grudge will not be forgotten.
I am not a medical professional. I am not certified to offer medical, psychiatric, or personal advice in any way. This is a roleplay blog—based off of a manipulative, abusive, charming character whom I do not own or in any way represent.
Do not use any of Dr Lecter’s advice. By submitting any ask, you are actively accepting the fact that this is purely entertainment and not any substitution for medical care. By submitting an ask, you are also accepting that I am not responsible for what you choose to do with the completely fictitious content which I produce.
To be very blunt: I don’t know what I’m doing. You should not expect me to. I don’t want to be sued because someone took a fictional character’s fictional advice. (Would you take the advice of a stranger at the bus stop? Your answer should be no, and you should treat this no differently.)
That being said, if you want someone to talk to, I can always offer a shoulder.
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The more established and fleshed-out your character, the more likely I am to want to play. This goes across the board for canonical characters and OCs. Grammatically-aware para/paragraph-style (third-person prose) preferred. I get rankled easily by consistent errors and/or lack of proofreading.
There is a very large difference between creative grammar/word choice/formatting and purple prose. 'Cerulean orbits' or other such nonsense? That's not creative; it makes no linguistic sense whatsoever. Bend grammar; don't flay the languague, ffs.
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If you’re just not feeling RP with me in general, that’s really ok. I promise I won’t get upset or turn you into salami. Just let me know so neither of us feels awkward about an abandoned thread sitting there. I’m drama-free, so please just communicate with me. Communication is awesome.
Relationships are not presumed, regardless of canon, without previous discussion.
Hannibal is not a woobie. He is not a sweet, misunderstood gentleman who just ‘happens’ to have a penchant for eating people whom he finds crass. Hannibal is a self-aware sociopath*; a calculating, cold-blooded monster hiding in a very fine suit. Please do not be surprised when he acts accordingly.
Your character has high odds of being maimed, murdered, and/or consumed.
On various spectra, I would categorise Hannibal as grey-panromantic (generally presenting as aromantic) and grey-pansexual (presenting as asexual). The vast majority of his physical sexuality is a power play; getting under his skin to something less constructed is extremely unlikely.
It should go without saying that this entire show is a giant trigger & ergo this blog will contain consistently mature/disturbing fictional content. Gore, NSFW images, and NSFW threads are not usually behind readmores. I will not make a habit of tagging gore, murder, cannibalism, etc, since doing so would be redundant.
However, if you would like a specific trigger tagged or put behind a readmore, please let me know. I’m more than happy to oblige.
And finally:
disclaimer: Hannibal Lecter is not my creative property, and I own nothing here except my own prose. This is all in good fun; I thank you in advance for not suing me.
Pending.
Pending.
Pending.
Pending.