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   So, this week we all saw the brain that Professor Grobstein took out of a lunch box, and carried around during class.  After hearing the story about how difficult it is to obtain a brain, I started to think why most scientists would want or need one.  In the case of our class, we got to look at the exterior of this brain.  We then learned that all of the convolutions on the exterior of the brain were not really the important "boxes" that we were interested in.  So, we didn't get to see the important "boxes."  Besides being cool, is there really any reason that our neurobiology class can learn from seeing a human brain?  

   If we tried to apply our evolving model of the nervous system to a real human brain (while whole), would we get anywhere?  To me, it seems that having a whole human brain doesn't correlate at all to our evolving model of the nervous system.  They seem completely separate, to the point where I am just imagining how the nervous system really operates out of the brain?  

   Perhaps part of the problem is that there are so many tiny connections, I can't make sense of the map.  To me, the heart makes sense because each major artery and vein has its own name.  The superior vena cava, or coronary artery is like Interstate 80 or 95 in that I can locate them.  Then there smaller back roads without names, and I can stand leaving them anonymous because I have a general idea of where the major connections are, and how they make the heart function.  But to me, the brain still seems like gook because there are no interstates for me to map.  Everything seems tiny and shuffled and scattered in the brain.