Blind Anger
‘A BLIND man can apparently ‘see’ emotions in the faces of others, according to new research by a team at the University of Wales.
| ”Okay, guess what I’m feeling now!” |
Even if he cannot distinguish movement, colours or even the presence of bright light, he can recognise fear, anger and happiness on the faces of others.
This is, says the Times, because the part of the brain used in recognising emotion is quite distinct from the part of the brain involved in normal vision.
The experiment, led by Dr Alan Pegna, involved showing an unnamed blind man 200 pictures of the faces of people showing a range of emotions.
He was able correctly to identify the emotion shown in 60% of the cases – a rate significantly higher than chance.
When blind Home Secretary David Blunkett next looks at his colleagues sitting round the Cabinet table, we fully expect him to score closer to 100%.
He can certainly assume that there is no-one there who is happy to see him, although the Prime Minister will no doubt confuse matters by wearing his trademark rictus grin.
In fact, Mr Blunkett need only gauge the degrees of anger among colleagues, many of whom he has insulted in a recent biography.
In the meantime, the Guardian says there is growing concern that his short-term survival in office may be overshadowed by long-term damage to his reputation.
In an interview broadcast by BBC Radio Sheffield at the weekend, the Home Secretary spoke of his three-year affair with Kimberley Quinn.
”I fell in love with someone and they wouldn’t go public and things started to go very badly wrong this summer, and then the News of the World picked up the story,” he said.
”I tried for three years to make something work. I haven’t spoken about it and I don’t intend to. And even in the biography that’s being written about me, I’ve ensured that there’s as little as possible.”
The same could not be said about his comments about colleagues.
And one minister predicted yesterday that Blunkett would reap that particular whirlwind after the election.
”Michael Howard’s remarks brought it home to Labour MPs how out of order David had been,” he said.
”He’s always been like it – when he gets frustrated, he wears his brains on his sleeve.”
And his hands down his trousers…’
Posted: 13th, December 2004 | In: Uncategorized Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
