It's a hoax, folks. Sorry to be the spoiler of a feel good story--that of Rom Houben, the Belgian man who allegedly "woke up" from a 23-year long coma--but the hard truth must win out over hopeful emotions. Houben's "communications," his "statements" about how he's been aware all along of his condition, his "talking" to reporters (all descriptive terms used by hardened journalists softened into bleeding heart jelly) is nothing more than the "ideomotor" effect, where the brain subtly and subconsciously guides the hands and fingers over a keyboard, or a Ouija board, or directs the movements of dowsing rods in search of underground water. You think it, the hand will move there. Dr. Sanjay Gupta missed it on CNN, Dr. Nancy Snyderman missed it on MSNBC. And neuroscientists untrained in skepticism and the history of facilitated communication all missed it.
Watch the video again here and here and note what the reporters say about how Houben was speaking, saying, talking, etc. For example:
He's doing no such thing. These reporters are watching these same videos are reporting something that did not happen. He did not say anything, nor did he describe or tell. Houben is just sitting there in a chair looking like he's in a coma, with the facilitator standing next to him, his hand firmed gripped by hers, guiding his hand over the keyboard. And yet the reporters report that he is guiding her hand! Watch it again. It's as clear as can be!
A simple test to prove my claim: show a picture of an object (say, a cat) to the facilitator and show a different picture of an object (say, a dog) to Huben. Don't let either one see the other photographs. Then see what gets typed: cat or dog? As a control, show them both the same picture and see what gets typed. Prediction: Whatever the facilitator sees is what will get typed. Would someone there please run this simple test?
Such a test was already done in the 1990s when something called "Facilitated Communication" (FC) was all the rage with autistic children who, just like the Coma Man, "suddenly awoke" from their long sleep and began talking up a storm and sounding all the world like perfectly normal bright children, some even returning to school to take classes. Only they weren't. Normal. Or talking. A facilitator stood next to a child, held his or her hand firmly in a grip with the index finger pointing down over a keyboard, then typed. In controlled tests by experimental psychologists, a photograph of an object was shown to the facilitator and a photograph of an object was shown to the child. Neither one saw what the other one saw. Sometimes the pictures were of the same objects, sometimes they were different. Result: whatever the facilitator saw is what got typed, 100% of the time, and never (0%) did what the child see get typed unless it was also what the facilitator saw. Did that end the travesty of exploitation of these autistic children? No. At least not for many years. Why? Because emotions almost always trump evidence. And, understandably, parents of autistic children want to believe that their children are normal. The tragedy is in the letdown and realization of what is really going on, which in time did happen. That is the power of belief.
Prediction: if the Coma Man story is not thoroughly debunked now, within a short time the families of people in comas will be snapping up these plastic keyboards and facilitating the communication of their loved ones locked up in a broken brain. Only they will be doing no such thing. They will be wasting their time, money, energy, and worst of all their emotions, setting themselves up for being crushed when awareness dawns on them that FC doesn't work. Please, would someone in the Houben family put an end to this charade before it spreads through the coma community and wreaks emotional havoc.
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How much do you want to bet no correction will be forthcoming? I predict the story will simply be dropped, with nothing further said. All of which demonstrates the thin line between amoral and immoral.
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/975121/belgian-coma-man-was-just-awake-for-23-years
I am not saying that I would consider him comatose though. He does appear to be conscious and able to react in a minimal manner. But not to the extent that has been reported.
I'd seen the video and my immediate reaction was wondering how you could tell there was ANY input from the subject. Beyond the ideomotor effect, most media reports featured a white lab coat attesting to how brain scans showed Houben to have normal brain activity ... therefore, clearly, he must be conscious and aware of his surroundings, and able to see, hear, etc.
Forget the cat/dog photo test. In theory, if there is a recognizable signal from Houben, someone who does not speak the same language as he should be able to relay a meaningful communication.
Furthermore, in order to type, one requires vision, and it hasn't been proved Houten is seeing anything.
If I can't see, I have no way of knowing what my assistant is holding my finger over. (Conventional touch typing also requires an anchor, with fingers on the base keys and the thumbs resting over the spacebar. Houten would seem to have no such awareness.) So we're being asked to believe that Houten not only has the keyboard layout memorized, he has the exact spacing of the keys relative to one another down pat.
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/25/doubting-a-medical-miracle/
The Vatican is lobbying for PVS and coma patients to be forcibly treated regardless of family wishes or living wills.
Conflict of interest?
That's a big red flag right there.
Also troubling is Laureys's conclusion that he is fully conscious seems to be based solely on the fact that a PET scan of the patient's brain is comparable to a fully conscious person's.
But even a PET scan shows the brain is metabolizing glucose at the same rate as a fully conscious person, that does not demonstrate that the brain cells are actually functioning at a high enough level to indicate the patient is fully conscious.
It's clear Laureys desperately wants to believe, but he has presented no credible evidence of either the misdiagnosis Laureys claims or that the patient is as aware as you or me.
What then, is the motive of the facilitator? Is it mercenary, wishful thinking, or do they consider their actions of benefit to those intimately involved in that situation?
Does the lack of detectable activity conclusively prove the non-viability of the mechanism Michael? Or are there effects concerning the functionality of the brain (one of many things) that currently elude us? If experiments using LSD are not illusionary. Then a state of suspended, yet almost instantaneously recoverable animation is not impossible, while that affected individual remains alive. Creating a mental rendition of how reality is (according to us). Then attempting to incorporate whatever we encounter into that model, isn’t scepticism or science. It’s blind, baseless, yet possibly fortifying faith. Of the very kind you may despise.
We seem to have an entire generation of so called 'experts', with as much professionalism and credibility as Sylvia Browne.
Just because you want to believe something is true, doesn't make it so. And exploiting vulnerable people to create the 'proof' for your wishful thinking is morally abhorrent.
If this case were not so tragic, it would be hilarious. Average people sitting at their computer screens have more sense, intelligence and awareness than these proven morons who are supposedly experts in their fields. How can they be fooled by such blatant fraud?
Anyway, thank you for a great article Mr Shermer.