How Scientifically Correct Is Severance?

The premise of Dan Erickson’s dystopian sci-fi collection “Severance” is novel and intriguing. The primary characters on the present work for a mysterious company referred to as Lumon who’ve perfected a brand new type of mind implant that provides its workers the proper work/life stability. When Lumon workers experience an elevator to their workplace, a pc chip of their brains prompts and erases all their recollections of the skin world. When they’re on the workplace, they solely know the workplace. Then, at 5 p.m. after they exit the constructing, the chip flips again, restoring their recollections of the skin world, however repressing all recollections of their workday. 

One other wrinkle: Lumon is so enigmatic and secretive that they do not let their workplace staff know something about their outer selves, or their “outies.” With a purpose to keep loyalty, “innies” are informed fantastical tales about their “outies” which are most assuredly not true. What’s Lumon doing? Why are they enjoying these bizarre reminiscence video games with their workers? The mysteries of “Severance” are huge and deep, and have been explored via the present’s two extant seasons. 

The questions are immediately tantalizing, and “Severance” has grow to be the one most-watched present in Apple TV+ historical past due to its premise and its surreal mysteries (why is Lumon elevating goats?). One other query additionally arises: is that even attainable? Is there a technique to “change off” recollections in a human mind that does not contain blunt-force trauma? Is there a technique to subsume an individual’s total character and substitute it with a tabula rasa, solely to revive that character later? 

The parents on the Dialog have appeared into it slightly. 

The Dialog article identified {that a} sure type of epilepsy surgical procedure, pioneered within the Forties, had medical doctors actually severing a affected person’s left and proper cerebrum into unattached halves. After surgical procedure, the sufferers’ separated mind halves had been then in a position to course of data independently of each other. This did not imply that the sufferers essentially developed two separate personalities with two separate reminiscence units, however it did indicate that such a factor could be attainable. Certainly, some research into “cut up mind” phenomenon started to come up within the Nineteen Seventies about individuals who had been flipping between two units of recollections. After all, these research examined what occurred when each conflicting halves of a split-brain affected person had been energetic on the similar time. One “half” would reply with speech, whereas the opposite would reply in writing, and the solutions had been completely different. 

The Dialog article goes deeply into particular case research, and the small print are fascinating, however it’s not fairly what we witness on “Severance.” In real-life, split-brain sufferers can recall sure issues after they learn and write, however different issues after they communicate. The left mind would not know what the precise hand is doing, so to talk. 

As an alternative, the “Severance” process could be tapping into the hippocampus of the mind to artificially instigate a split-brain impact, however this time with all of the studying and writing abilities left intact inside each halves of the mind. As all of us recall from highschool biology, the hippocampus is the a part of the mind that divides one’s recollections of the day up into easily-understood “episodes.” Quibis, if you’ll. One can neglect small particulars from Quibi to Quibi, however you at all times bear in mind the entire arc of your day. 

Once you enter a brand new room, a brand new Quibi begins, and your mind type of “forgets” what occurred on the earlier episode because it data a brand new one. The mind chips in “Severance” might very nicely be prolonging that forgetfulness, permitting a Lumon worker to neglect all the pieces about what got here earlier than the second they stepped into the elevator. The fantastical aspect of the “Severance” chips is that in addition they appear to work the opposite method, erasing the work day while you go away the workplace … after which restoring the primary set of recollections. The interaction inside the hippocampus would not work that method, and the “severed” a part of the mind could not be “severed again,” because it had been. When you’re watching a Quibi, it is everlasting. 

Additionally, on “Severance” the “innies” have new units of recollections and purchased abilities all their very own. The primary characters (performed by Adam Scott, Britt Decrease, Zach Cherry, and John Turturro) work within the “macrodata refinement” division, a talent they do not know about of their outdoors lives. They know all concerning the rituals and historical past of Lumon on the within. The hippocampus would possibly reset each time you enter a room, however acquired abilities and longer-term recollections would stick round. The “Severance” mind chips are clearly doing one thing rather more than dividing the 2 halves of the mind. 

Additionally, it is established all through “Severance” that the mind chips aren’t contingent on strolling via doorways or being on the Lumon places of work. Lumon managers even have the talents to flips the chips on and off on a whim, permitting the “innies” to stroll round outdoors and vice versa. So this has much more occurring than Quibi-ing the mind. The chips flip forwards and backwards between two units of recollections which are alternately repressed. As a result of “innies” and “outies” have completely different recollections and abilities, they’ve completely different personalities. And this, now we have to confess, is the stuff of science fiction. 

However excellent science fiction. Season 3 is coming. Get hype.