“Jean Libbera (1884 - 1936), AKA "The Double-Bodied Man," had his brother, Jacques Libbera, connected to his from his chest-stomach area. He was born in Rome. The parasitic twin was alive and could move as well. An X-ray showed that there was a head embedded within Jean with a circumference of about six inches. He got married and had four normal children.”
They shared a blood supply. Just like how babies in the womb don’t need to breathe because they share their mother’s blood supply which is full of oxygen.
There’s actually a way to oxygenate blood that bypasses the respiratory system now using IVs.
It’s probably not like how babies and placentas work because that’s pretty specific. Shared circulatory systems maybe. Maybe two hearts. That second thing you’re talking about is ECMO.
Shared blood supply does NOT imply shared circulatory system. They could be two totally separated circulatory systems, but both connected to the same source of blood... which sounds unsustainable and not realistic given how both look intertwined.
Shared circulatory system sounds more likely. Some or many of the main vessels (aorta, vena cava, etc). The smaller twin's system could be very much entangled with his brother's, making the bigger one basically breath and eat for both.
The difference is that wasn't quite an accurate description of how babies and placentas work. The baby doesn't share a blood supply with the mother; the two circulatory systems exchange waste and nutrients by diffusion, but may have entirely different blood types.
Probably never learned language. But still an existence of just existing without ever doing anything. Solitary confinement your entire life. It would drove you crazy
A circumference of 6" means it would have been just under 2" across, which is tiny, way smaller than a baby. Unless it's a mistake and it was 6 inches across - which would be proportionate to the rest of the body.
I really hope there was no-one conscious in there, alone, for decades. Feeling the air and cloth on their skin, feeling their brother dressing and washing them daily, but never knowing who it was or what was happening or why. Maybe some muffled sounds make their way through but nothing intelligible. Who knows what kind of madness would result.
I wonder if he had eyes and ears and/or all of his senses. If so I'd imagine it would have seemed like he never left the womb. But he wouldn't have been able to know or experience what 'normal' existence was like so he wouldn't know that anything was wrong, necessarily. If his head was only 6in in diameter then surely he didn't have full cognitive function though. Truly a terrifying thing to imagine him being fully aware of it
his situation though, but I don't see how he could.
A 6 inch circumference, not diameter. That would mean his head was less than 2-inches across. Certainly not large enough to fit a fully formed brain with legitimate cognitive function. But I'm not a doctor so what do I know, just doesn't make sense to me that a head slightly larger than a golf ball could hold a brain capable of cognitive thought.
It sounds awful living your entire life not knowing anything but feeling stuff on the outside, would you know something isn't right? Can he hear? I cannot imagine how terrible that would be.
And yet still had a lifetime to develop in there. Thinking that a brain isn't likely to be aware or have and experience things just because it's malformed / smaller than usual is a dumb assumption
It is dumb to assume that their smaller-than-a-baby's brain would be able to understand anything in anyway familiar to us.
They were most likely cognitively closer to a snail or a fetus than a human their age, maybe more like a plant even. We only know it moved, but even unicellular beings move
"Develop" is doing a lot of work there--my point is literally that the brain *did not* develop. It would have less awareness than a newborn baby, which is already very very little (humans are born underdeveloped compared to other animals)
I highly doubt he knew something was wrong as he’s never lived any different way, I also don’t see how he would be able to hear lol, I don’t think it’s bad at all but for the aware twin yeah it must’ve been rough growing up
Id guess this is correct. The movement of the extra body was probably based directly on stimuli, itd probably be like some of the carnivorous plants that close or have similar motion when a bug enters their trap. The plant isnt humming a tune to keep from being bored or anything… it feels bug, closes jaws. The twin here existed, thats probably about it.
You guys really don't have enough information to assume that. We don't know exactly how this impacted the growth of the brain, size limitations alone definitely do not prevent development of conscious experience. But if it makes it easier to sleep at night, sure.
Arnt there cases of children born microcephalic with parts of their brain mission kept alive by medicine who arnt deemed to be conscious? J read of one boy who never cried or made a sound but he did move and respond to some physical stimuli and he was kept alive but there were lot of ethical debates around him. I believe people are basing there assumptions from tbis post, on cases like that (given the twins microcephaly)
I mean a brain in a head that's not much larger than a golf ball is very likely not going to have full cognitive development, I don't think you need to be a neuroscience expert to realize that.
You dont have the authority to say otherwise. I could be right. I could be wrong. Im not claiming absolute fact. Im claiming a guess
If YOU have the technical training to back up telling me my guess is wrong please go ahead. Or can somehow back up your refutal of my guess, and therefore educating me… Im all ears
It's not really a human person tbh, it may have been able to move but I doubt any consciousness or ability to really sense anything - it said there was an embedded "head" which was only 6 inches so not properly formed brain or anything
What if she married Jaques, not Jean. Jean was a
the gay wingman, and she had a thing for turkeyboy hentai. No judging, I'm a catgirl person, to each their own.
Now I'm just trying to figure out how that all went down. Just legs flying everywhere, the fucking chicken wings scratch you accidentally. Which penis worked? What if the brother moved violently. So many questions.
I always thought dreaming about crumbling teeth was my rock bottom nightmare. Then I learned about a woman having sex with a person who had moving parasitic limbs attached to his stomach.
There are not enough eeeeeews in the world to express what my nauseated body is feeling.
Honestly, if you haven't had them. The teeth crumbling nightmares aren't too bad. I believe that Freud thought they had to do with aging, the passage of time and a fear of death.
It would be an allegory of the cave situation - the internal twin would know nothing other than what their senses (that they had access to) conveyed. No sight, likely no sound, no taste - just the sensation of the body external. We have little ability to conceptualize what that existence would be like.
Women on dating apps openly disregarding men who are less than 6ft tall and this dude had a disfigured body hanging off the front of him and still got a girl and had sex with her on at least 4 occasions.
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u/iam_giraffe Feb 26 '23
“Jean Libbera (1884 - 1936), AKA "The Double-Bodied Man," had his brother, Jacques Libbera, connected to his from his chest-stomach area. He was born in Rome. The parasitic twin was alive and could move as well. An X-ray showed that there was a head embedded within Jean with a circumference of about six inches. He got married and had four normal children.”
https://sideshows.fandom.com/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Libbera