April 4, 2013 — Dr. Francis Collins

EPISODE NUMBER: 9081 (April 4, 2013)
GUEST: Dr. Francis Collins
SEGMENTS: Pegasus Pipeline Spill | Koko & Jeremy Irons on Gay Marriage | Obama’s BRAIN Initiative | Sign-Off-EEG Cap
SUIT REPORT: Black Suit  | Striped White Shirt | Red/Blue Striped Tie
VIDEOS: Thursday, April 4, 2013

“The Obama administration launches a new science initiative. We already have the potato clock, what more is there to know? And my guest, NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins, is trying to map the human brain. Thank God. I get lost up there all the time. The Queen of England just got a 7.5 million dollar raise. It was that or lose her to the Miami Heat. This is the Colbert Report.”

Pegasus Pipeline Spill

A very interesting development to consider in the fight for the Keystone Pipeline. The Pegasus pipeline has spilled oil in a place other than the wilderness. It’s a place that really matters! Suburbia.

Oh wait, it wasn’t oil. I forgot. It was diluted bitumen.

• I could not be more upset if someone paid me to be angry, which they do.
• Nation, I don’t care much for the environment. If it was that important to protect it, why isn’t it Scotchgarded?
• We have been hit by a massive Canada spill. We still haven’t recovered from the last one, when Celine Dion spilled all over Las Vegas. It’s been ten years, we still can’t get the white leather pants out.

The environmentalists are worried that with the Keystone, it will be analogous to this spill. Stephen had to look up what analogous means.

With dictionary in hand he was able to then call all those pipeline critics, “anaphylactic”.

Arkansas doesn’t have an oil spill, they have a bitumen spill, which is harder to clean up because it sinks into the ground. “out of sight, out of mind and into the drinking supply”.

Koko & Jeremy Irons on Gay Marriage

Apparently Koko, the gorilla who knows sign language, has been taught to say that gay marriage is bad. It made “Koko sad”.

• Congratulations gay people. Congratulations, Koko sad!

Then Jeremy Irons weighed in in an interview with “The Huffing-gay Post”. He has “no strong feelings either way” but he’s worried about changing the definition of marriage because it may lead to father-son marriage and in England a father can avoid paying taxes on estate transfer by marrying his son and passing it down to him.

• So if gay marriage is legalized in England, Jeremy Irons’ son Max? get ready to make your father the happiest man alive.

In the end of the interview he wishes everyone well, so that makes it all okay, right? Stephen demonstrates, in an English accent, why it’s fine to say anything offensive as long as you express no strong feeling either way and wish everyone well.

(as Jeremy Irons) “What’s to stop a man from dressing up as a woman to get equal pay? I mean………insurance wise, it’s a nightmare. Won’t their menses attract wolves? but I…I wish you all the best no matter who’s running your company, whether it’s a woman or a dog, it’s superb.”

Obama’s BRAIN Initiative

President Obama wants Congress to spend $100 million to map the human brain.

• 100 million for a map? They give ’em out for free at Long John Silver’s.

Obama is calling it the “next great American project”.

• I remember when the next great American project was going to the moon. How hard is it to go to the brain? You just grab an ice pick and go to town.(makes jabbing into eye gesture) Work it around…OH! I remember summer camp!

Obama is calling it the BRAIN initiative which stands for Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies.

• That’s right. The B in BRAIN, stands for brain.

>Obama is trying to take away our brains. I’m guessing Fox News will start calling him a zombie now. Stephen is worried that Obama wants his brain so he shows us a zoom-in on his brain which has among other things, tumbleweeds and the hot dog guy.

Interview - Dr. Francis Collins

This was a most enjoyable interview, and somewhat long too. I wish that he had done the Jon thing and done an extended interview for the web. He was very interested in this technology and the possibilities that can come with it. Me too.

Dr. Collins: It is the most complicated biological structure in the known universe.
Stephen: Now, are they all rainbow flags?
Dr. Collins: No, this is sort of a teaching model.
Stephen: Just didn’t know if it was like a gay marriage thing.

Stephen: Did you know there are more nerve endings in your gut than in your brain?
Dr. Collins: Well there are a lot, but the brain has 86 billion nerve endings that make 1000 connections, so it’s a very complex structure.
Stephen: So are you saying that there are more nerve endings in the brain?
Dr. Collins: I believe there are, yes.
Stephen: Who told you that, your brain?

So in order to know how the brain works as it’s actually “on”, Stephen volunteered to strap on a hat.

“People of Earth!! I come in peace!”

“Can I bend spoons with my mind now?”

Stephen: Where can I stab this thing with a pencil to get “Call Me Maybe” out of my head?

Stephen: There’s the structure of the brain, but then there’s the influence upon the brain, as you grow up you’re given priorities in your thinking, the decision tree of your life and the “if-then’s” are different for every single person, how can you map that on one person and have it mean something for anyone else?
Dr. Collins: That’s a brilliant question.
Stephen: I’m a brilliant man.

Yes you are Stephen. That’s why we love you. Dr. Collins indicated that at some point we will understand the answer to that question but that’s why we need to map the brain.

Stephen: If I could speed up my brain, would time slow down?
Dr. Collins: No it would … yeah, I guess it would actually.
Stephen: OOOH!! I just blew your mind! I just blew your mind, buddy.
Dr. Collins: (looking mockingly exasperated) I’d have to think about that one.

The good doc goes on to say that the big reason why they are doing this is to find answers to disorders such as Autism, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Epilepsy and others.

Stephen painted a very nice picture of finding the pleasure center in the brain where he was a freshman in high school on a snow day and his mom is serving him tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches. “If you can find that, just hook up a 220 line to it, crank it up and rip off the knob”

Yeah, who wouldn’t love that.

Dr. Collins: Woody Allen said this was his 2nd favorite organ.
Stephen: Well you can already hook up cables to that other one.