ABR article: "the heart does think"

Is there any scientific basis for the physiological claim below?

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ABR ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER
Vol. 5, Issue 5
May 15, 2005
http://www.biblearchaeology.org

"Does the Heart 'Think'?"

The wording of Genesis 6:5 makes it sounds of as if the human heart is
capable of thinking, or at least of having some sort of emotional
capacity: "And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the
earth, and that every imagination of THE THOUGHTS OF HIS HEART was only
evil continually." Critics deem this expression to be unscientific,
since the heart is viewed as a purely mechanical pump. However, the
science journal Discover, in a review of the book A Man after His Own
Heart by Charles Siebert, reported that Siebert's book recognized

...that the heart is no mere pump, as some physicians still insist, but
a sophisticated participant in the regulation of emotion. The heart has
a mind of its own: It secretes its own brainlike hormones and actively
partakes in a dialogue among the internal organs-a dialogue on which
cardiac researchers are only beginning to eavesdrop. The heart likewise
undergoes all manner of organic change inflicted on it by the
tempestuous brain and its neurochemicals. As one doctor explains, people
do suffer heartbreak, literally. (Burdick 2004: 72).
The journal used the real-life example of William Schroeder, who was the
second (as well as the longest-surviving) recipient of the Jarvik-7
artificial heart. As a purely mechanical pump of his blood, the device
kept Schroeder alive for an unprecedented 620 days. However, as Discover
reported:

The patient's mental state was another matter. Schroeder was weepy and
deeply despondent. (Barney Clark, the first Jarvik-7 recipient,
expressed a wish to die or be killed.) The blood still circulated, but
something vital-some emotionally charged communication between heart and
mind-had been lost... Affirming all [alleged] myths, the hear truly is a
seat of human emotion. The Jarvik-7, in contrast, was deaf to the song
of human experience; built to invigorate its patient, it instead
alienated him, supplying Schroeder with everything but the will to live.
He had the look, Siebert writes, 'of a man who has lost his heart'
(Burdick 2004: 72).
It is discoveries like these that should caution us not to be too quick
in judging the Book of Genesis as scientifically unsound.

Reference:

Burdick, A. 2004. Review of A Man after His Own Heart, by Charles
Siebert. Discover 25, no. 5.

Stephen Caesar holds his master's degree in anthropology/archaeology
from Harvard. He is a staff member at Associates for Biblical Research
and the author of the e-book The Bible Encounters Modern Science,
available at www.authorhouse.com.
Received on Tue May 17 15:34:33 2005