Soul Transplant List

Apparently, the ancient egyptians were right, the heart is the seat of consciousness. The Daily Mail reports:

They argue, in effect, that our hearts, livers and every single organ in the body stores our memories, drives our emotions and imbues us with our own individual characters. Our whole body, they believe, is the seat of the soul; not just the brain.

And if any of these organs should be transplanted into another person, parts of these memories - perhaps even elements of the soul - might also be transferred.

There are now more than 70 documented cases similar to Sonny's, where transplant patients have taken on some of the personality traits of the organ donors.

(Sonny received a heart transplant and fell in love at first sight with the donors wife)

Wow, 70 cases! That sure is a lot. No tangible medical evidence to speak of, no proposed mechanism for how organs might have memory, just anecdotal evidence of 70 cases out of many thousands*.

I think it's a load of new age crap that people would love to believe, but that's an unscientific thing to say. Who knows, maybe organs do store memories somehow, biology is pretty complicated. So if these people want to spend their time researching it, fine. But 70 cases is not credible evidence, and until they can propose a mechanism, it's barely science at all.

Error scale: 5. Could be right, be very, very weak evidence.

-Enginerd

* A little over 2,000 in the US in '06. Source: American Heart Association