Aaron Hernandez's Brain

[Paa Langfart]

How is this Panther related ?  Luke

 

Quote

Aaron Hernandez suffered the most severe case of chronic traumatic encephalopathy ever discovered in a person his age, damage that would have significantly affected his decision-making, judgment and cognition, researchers at Boston University revealed at a medical conference Thursday.

Ann McKee, the head of BU’s CTE Center, which has studied the disease caused by repeated brain injury for more than decade, called Hernandez’s brain “one of the most significant contributions to our work” because of the brain’s pristine condition and the opportunity to study the disease in a 27-year-old brain.

Hernandez, a former New England Patriots tight end, committed suicide in April in a Massachusetts prison while serving a life sentence for the murder of his friend Odin Lloyd in 2013. Hernandez hanged himself with a bedsheet.

Doctors diagnosed Hernandez with Stage 3 CTE, which researchers had never seen in a brain younger than 46 years old, McKee said. His brain had significant damage to the front lobe, which impacts a person’s ability to make decisions and moderate behavior.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/aaron-hernandez-suffered-from-most-severe-cte-ever-found-in-a-person-his-age/2017/11/09/fa7cd204-c57b-11e7-afe9-4f60b5a6c4a0_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_hernandez-3p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.111cf4ae9fcb

[Paa Langfart]

On a side note - does this finding make you feel any differently about Hernandez and his behavior prior to his death ?

[Popsickle]

7 minutes ago, Paa Langfart said:

On a side note - does this finding make you feel any differently about Hernandez and his behavior prior to his death ?

Ugh...firestorm is approaching but here it goes. 

If i remember correctly Hernandez had a history poor behavior issues dating back prior to college. While CTE may have played an issue with some of his later actions I don't think it's possible to write off all his actions throughout his life. 

I am not a doctor, just my opinion. 

[Dex]

CTE exacerbated and influenced behavior that was already prevalent. Still a piece of poo murderer. 

 

 

Source: I have epilepsy and have had more concussions than I can count and I haven't killed anyone...

[sharkkiller]

11 minutes ago, Paa Langfart said:

On a side note - does this finding make you feel any differently about Hernandez and his behavior prior to his death ?

Nope he was a homicidal maniac. He killed at least two people, and shot two more. He was a lunatic while he was in college. 

I have no doubt that CTE is a serious issue, but I foresee a lot of ex football players (not at the pro level, I mean high school and college) using it as an excuse for committing crimes. There is no way to disprove it until they are dead. 

[Khyber53]

33 minutes ago, Paa Langfart said:

On a side note - does this finding make you feel any differently about Hernandez and his behavior prior to his death ?

Yeah, it does make me feel pity for the human being that had once been there. It doesn't excuse, in any way what he did, but it may explain it.

 

[AggieLean]

Yea, I feel for him. Your mind can be your worst enemy at times, and with CTE, to constantly have to deal with the head games, I can’t imagine. He’s done some bad things for quite awhile, but if I recall, he lost a parent at a young age as well. Life wasn’t easy for him, to say the least. I do now, and have always felt bad for him.

[sharkkiller]

4 minutes ago, AggieLean said:

Yea, I feel for him. Your mind can be your worst enemy at times, and with CTE, to constantly have to deal with the head games, I can’t imagine. He’s done some bad things for quite awhile, but if I recall, he lost a parent at a young age as well. Life wasn’t easy for him, to say the least. I do now, and have always felt bad for him.

There are millions of people who have lost parents at young ages and were raised in bad situations. But they didn't turn into homicidal maniacs. There are also thousands of people who have CTE and never killed anyone. Why do people insist on finding excuses for people doing bad things? He was simply an evil person, and deserves no one's pity. His child does, but not him. 

[RealisticPanther]

Dude there's CLEARLY no such thing as CTE. Yes, the brain looks different---but there's been absolutely no studies establishing cognitive deficits in people with CTE relative to "normal, healthy" subjects..nor is there any anecdotal evidence of such..all the old football players are anecdotally perfectly fine and aren't any worse off than the general population. 

CTE is a bunch of propaganda, and anyone who believes in CTE doesn't have very good logic skills in my opinion and maybe should be worried about their own cognition.

[AggieLean]

2 minutes ago, sharkkiller said:

There are millions of people who have lost parents at young ages and were raised in bad situations. But they didn't turn into homicidal maniacs. There are also thousands of people who have CTE and never killed anyone. Why do people insist on finding excuses for people doing bad things? He was simply an evil person, and deserves no one's pity. His child does, but not him. 

I have my stance and how I choose to view him, and you have yours. I will show him compassion, sympathy, and pity and nothing you say will change that. You are free to view him as you please.

I know quite a few individuals who grew up in bad situations, and some turned out fine, while others didn’t. Not one person is the same, and what I’ve learned from losing a sibling at an early age, is everyone grieves differently. Those who didn’t turn out fine, get my pity just the same. I’m also in no way saying that Hernandez or anyone who does bad deserves to go unpunished. Hernandez was where he needed to be and punished accordingly.

[Eazy-E]

CTE isn’t going to turn someone into a stupid wanna be gangster.

Source: Family of psychiatrists 

[sharkkiller]

2 minutes ago, AggieLean said:

I have my stance and how I choose to view him, and you have yours. I will show him compassion, sympathy, and pity and nothing you say will change that. You are free to view him as you please.

I know quite a few individuals who grew up in bad situations, and some turned out fine, while others didn’t. Not one person is the same, and what I’ve learned from losing a sibling at an early age, is everyone grieves differently. Those who didn’t turn out fine, get my pity just the same. I’m also in no way saying that Hernandez or anyone who does bad deserves to go unpunished. Hernandez was where he needed to be and punished accordingly.

Fair enough.

I just get tired of hearing, "Well he was raised in a single parent home." "He grew up in a bad neighborhood." 

I just think, well yeah, so were a lot of other people, and they didn't choose to take someone down a dirt road and put a bullet in their head. Or whatever it was they did. I just think if you made a choice like that, you do not deserve pity.

I have made bad choices in life, but would never expect someone to pity me for any of them. I made the choices, and I have to live with the consequences. 

This particular case is exacerbated by the fact that he was given every possible opportunity to succeed in life, and he chose to kill people. Supposedly over a spilled drink in a bar. 

[Nails]

Like sand through the hourglass, these are the last days of American Football.  

[LinvilleGorge]

38 minutes ago, RealisticPanther said:

Dude there's CLEARLY no such thing as CTE. Yes, the brain looks different---but there's been absolutely no studies establishing cognitive deficits in people with CTE relative to "normal, healthy" subjects..nor is there any anecdotal evidence of such..all the old football players are anecdotally perfectly fine and aren't any worse off than the general population. 

CTE is a bunch of propaganda, and anyone who believes in CTE doesn't have very good logic skills in my opinion and maybe should be worried about their own cognition.

Let me guess, you probably also think that human related climate change is a lie, that the Earth is flat, and that the Vegas shooting was some kind of government conspiracy, right?