Memory lane

Two stands of memory came together over this morning's bread and cheese.

The first strand was a lady psychologist working out of Steel House in Tothill Street, once something to do with steel and then, in so far as I can recall, the home of the Institute for Manpower Studies, a semi-detached element of the Department of Employment, mostly housed across the street. She taught me the phrase REM sleep, which then lay dormant for some years.

The second strand was a quizmaster working out of the Mitre in Tooting who used to run pub quizzes which were popular with doctors and nurses from nearby St. George's. He pandered to said medicos by including regular questions involving the two smallest bones in a human body, which, as a result, I now know to be in the ear.

These two strands came together this morning in a mutant version of REM which is to do with ears, that is to say rapid ear movement, the ear equivalent of rapid eye movement, first properly documented in cats. Sometimes called MEMA, for middle ear muscle activity, rather than REM, to reduce confusion.

Rapid ear movement is generated by the two smallest muscles in the human body, one for each of the two smallest bones. One is controlled by the seventh cranial nerve and serves to damp down what would otherwise be the loud noise of our own eating while the other is controlled by the fifth cranial nerve and serves to damp down what would otherwise the the loud noise of our own voice. An example of the tricky feedback systems built into our sensory apparatus; it is certainly not the case that this camera never lies.

I have not checked but I suppose that the seventh nerve is mainly to do with looking after the eating apparatus, while the fifth nerve is mainly to do with looking after the speaking apparatus. Or vice versa.

PS: at the same breakfast, I read of Google and Apple fighting hard to be allowed to continue to offer their GCHQ proof encrypted services. Services which, inter alia, provide safe havens in which people who are bad or worse can do their business. To my mind, yet another example of technology and the drive to make money from it outstripping society's ability to control it. We live in a complicated society and we have to allow the people who look after it full access. We have to trust them - with the machinery needed for them to earn that trust not being rocket science.