Gilles de la Tourette Syndrome

[Agent Smith]

A simple question: Why doesn't Tourette Syndrome manifest in written form?

The "illness" is restricted to speech. 

Points to discuss.

1. The written word and the spoken word vis-à-vis our brain's language center.

2. A possible "cure" if, for instance, we can fool the brain of a Tourette person into thinking s/he's writing instead of speaking.

Edited May 25, 2022 by Agent Smith

[Michael McMahon]

1 hour ago, Agent Smith said:

Why doesn't Tourette Syndrome manifest in written form?

 

That's interesting. Maybe it's like stuttering in that sense where they don't repeat the same letters when they're writing. I never stutter when I'm forming my thoughts in my head but very rarely in conversation I might jumble up a word. Replacing what you were going to say with a synonym makes it easier but it might also make the problem more frequent in your self-awareness. Thus many strategies alter the ratio of frequency versus intensity without being perfect cures. If you imagined that you were speaking impersonally to a robot instead of a conscious being then this would be much like writing. However you'd then have to sacrifice a lot of your metaphysical awareness which might be a Pyrrhic victory. You might solve one problem by creating another!

[Agent Smith]

Very interesting points. Product defect

[TheVat]

Are we certain that Tourette's doesn't manifest in writing YOU GRAVY LICKING PIG BASTARD!?

Jesting aside, most Tourette's involves tics like throat clearing or excess blinking, and not speech, so writing wouldn't impact it in any way.   The form of Tourette's highlighted by popular media, called coprolalia, is actually quite rare.  

[Agent Smith]

On 6/7/2022 at 8:44 PM, TheVat said:

Are we certain that Tourette's doesn't manifest in writing YOU GRAVY LICKING PIG BASTARD!?

Jesting aside, most Tourette's involves tics like throat clearing or excess blinking, and not speech, so writing wouldn't impact it in any way.   The form of Tourette's highlighted by popular media, called coprolalia, is actually quite rare.  

That's news to me! Gracias.

Any ideas as to what actually happens to the brain in coprolalia?

[TheVat]

Last I heard, most tic disorders of that kind are related to either damage (stroke, TBI) or developmental problems in a set of control and inhibitory circuits in the brain in the basal ganglia.  The brain bubbles with impulses that the BG normally controls and filters with oversight from the prefrontal cortex.  Emotions, voluntary motor movements, eye movements, action selections....the BG is involved with controlling them.  Most Tourettes for example is fairly minor dysfunction so you just get throat clearing, blinking, facial tics.  Coprolalia is less common because it involves the greater complexity of speech actions and therefore greater dysfunction in the BG and poorer coordination with higher cortical centers.  

No real cure, just management of the particular form and comorbidities a person has.  Basically it's an exploration of techniques to instill some control mechanisms in the brain.

[Michael McMahon]

I closed my eyes out of sensory dissociation while I stuttered to a waiter. Speaking as if you were in a world of your own can sometimes be a solipsistic rather than shameful countermeasure to stuttering. 

"People who stutter may be attempting to protect themselves from seeing a listener reaction. If so, they are mind reading, or presuming to know the reaction of the listener. It is often associated with guilt and shame over one’s stuttering."

https://www.stuttering-specialist.com/post/more-than-meets-the-eye-contact-averting-eye-contact

[Michael McMahon]

Randomness is the opposite of determinism as we see in the physics debate between quantum mechanics and classical mechanics. Likewise a random word salad is the opposite of obsessive actions or thoughts. It might be a bit of a risk to solve one problem by creating another. Nonetheless OCD patients obsessed with patterns of touch might benefit from taking a risk through chaotic movements.