# Questions about the feeling that one inhabits one's head **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 5, 2006, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-about-the-feeling-that-one-inhabits-ones-head/363245 "2006-07-05T03:42:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Absolute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Absolute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absolute)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2006, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-about-the-feeling-that-one-inhabits-ones-head/363245/1 "2006-07-05T03:42:40Z")
If I had to pick a part of my body that I feel my soul, consciousness, or whatever inhabits, it would definitely be my head. I’m curious if there’s been any study of why this is the case, and why I don’t feel like “I” inhabit my right hand instead, or chest. Here are a bunch of somewhat random questions I’ve thought up about the topic. Answers to any of them, or additional questions, are welcome. Is there a name for this sensation? Have there ever been any otherwise normal people who reported not feeling it, or feeling it in a different part of their body? Have blind people reported the same thing (meaning, is it only because I see out of my head that I experience this)? Is the answer different for people who were blind since birth? What about people who are blind and deaf - did Hellen Keller ever mention anything on the subject? Were there any people who were blind, deaf and smell-less, with no special senses coming from their head? What about people with inner-ear damage? Or astronauts - does the feeling go away once you’re in zero gravity? ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2006, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-about-the-feeling-that-one-inhabits-ones-head/363245/2 "2006-07-05T20:18:24Z")
There has been some investigation of this - I can’t find a convenient cite offhand. It’s probably at least partially culturally determined. Ancient people may have felt that their “self” inhabited their chests, rather than their heads. This would be consistent with the common belief in those times that the heart was the seat of intelligence, rather than the brain. In ancient Greece, this belief started to change around the 5th century BC, according to this wiki article: > **[History of neuroscience](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_brain#Earliest_views)** > > From the ancient Egyptian mummifications to 18th-century scientific research on "globules" and neurons, there is evidence of neuroscience practice throughout the early periods of history. The early civilizations lacked adequate means to obtain knowledge about the human brain. Their assumptions about the inner workings of the mind, therefore, were not accurate. Early views on the function of the brain regarded it to be a form of "cranial stuffing" of sorts. In ancient Egypt, from the late Middle ... Although, even during the 4th century BC, Aristotle hadn’t bought it yet: > [@](#): > > During the 4th century BC Aristotle though that, while the heart was the seat of intelligence, the brain was a cooling mechanism for the blood . He reasoned that humans are more rational than the beasts because, among other reasons, they have a larger brain to cool their hot-bloodedness [2]. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2006, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-about-the-feeling-that-one-inhabits-ones-head/363245/3 "2006-07-05T20:23:02Z")
I’m sure that it has a lot to do with where your eyes and ears are, because they are the main sense that you use to locate external objects, and the eyes in particular are very directly connected with the brain, while the ears are located on the two sides of the brain. The interesting issue would be what happens with people who are born blind and deaf. ---
**Author:** ![Staggerlee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/staggerlee/32/3134_2.png) [@Staggerlee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Staggerlee)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2006, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/questions-about-the-feeling-that-one-inhabits-ones-head/363245/4 "2006-07-05T22:23:14Z")
My excessive sense of the cranium (and all the rest of it) at times is mostly because it’s the last place I would like to be kicked. The brain’s not second in my list.