International Neuroscience Journal. 2015 March; 1(1):e884. http://dx.doi.org/10.17795/inj884 Published online 2015 March 28. Editorial History of the Neurosciences in the United States of America Jacques Morcos 1,*; Anthony Wang 2 1Clinical Neurosurgery and Otolaryngology, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA 2Department of Neurosurgery, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA : Jacques Morcos, Clinical Neurosurgery and Otolaryngology, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA. Tel/Fax: +1-3052434675, E-mail:
[email protected] *Corresponding author Received: March 5, 2015; Accepted: March 15, 2015 Neurosciences in USA; Neurosurgery in USA Keywords: “How can a three-pound mass of jelly that you can hold States of America. The physician who attended him that in your palm imagine angels, contemplate the meaning September day in 1848, John Martyn Harlow1, noted that of infinity, and even question its own place in the cos- Gage’s friends found him “no longer Gage,” and that the mos?” pondered the neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran. balance between his “intellectual faculties and animal His quest for an understanding of the brain, like that of propensities” had vanished. He could not stick to plans, many others, represents our basic human desire to com- uttered “the grossest profanity,” and showed “little defer- prehend the mystery of the most complex volume of ence for his fellows.” The railroad-construction company matter in the entire universe. It is no wonder that neu- that employed him refused to take him back, and Gage roscience has emerged as the queen of all biological dis- eventually died after several seizures at the age of 36.