What organ do you consider to be the most vital: the Heart or the Brain?

Question

Give details and why you think so.

Remember, the heart can beat on it's own, without initiation from the brain.

Answer 1

I would consider the brain to be more essential, in the sense of containing more of my essence. It is the seat of conciousness, personality, appreciation, thought, pleasure,and pain: in short, all that we think of as our humanity resides in our brains. The rest of the body is largely life support for the brain and the reproductive system.

People can live with artificial or transplanted hearts: at this point in time, it is nonsensical to even contemplate an artificial or replacement brain, because we have no way of even beginnning to think about the means of not only transferring all of the elaborately networked information that is contained in the brain, but also replicating the highly individualized processing patterns that make us who we are. I have worked extensively with brain-injured people, as well as those who have suffered heart damage, and there is simply no comparison. ALL of my brain-injured patients feel that they have lost part of who they are, that their injuries have left them quite literally a different person. While some of my cardiac patients have expereinced a sense of loss or limitation due to restrictions on activity, none have reported that sense of being someone else.

The brain has it hands down, for me.

Answer 2

Ouches...that's a tough question. You can't live without either. But, if there is some damage to the brain, there are machines that can keep you alive, but in a vegetative state, you really can't do that with the heart, and without the oxygen being supplied to the brain from the heart, the brain dies. But the opposite is also true for the heart. Without the brain telling the heart to beat..it can't. I'd have to say...both, really. One can't survive without the other.

Answer 3

Kay G, the Brain does not control the heart. The heart powers the brain. Fool.

The Heart is the most vital. It powers the ENTIRE body.

Answer 4

Your brain. But not for very long. Here's why...
When a person has open heart surgery, they are hooked up to a mechanical "heart-lung machine."
Their own heart is stopped for a while, until the surgery is completed.
After the surgery, doctors will start your own heart pumping again. Or if given a heart transplant, start that heart pumping.
But they could not stop your brain for that amount of time.
Or give you a brain transplant.
Get it?

Answer 5

The heart and the brain fuel each other - the brain causes the heart to beat involuntarily and the brain is fed by the blood supplied by the heart. However, the heart can be replaced but the brain cannot.

I choose brain.

Answer 6

The Brain

OK the heart pumps blood to the brain to make it work, but without the brain sending it the signal to pump that wouldn't happen.

PS: Congratulation - You are the recipient of the answer that takes me to exactly 50,000 points.

Answer 7

Both are what keeps us alive, but the brain is more delicate... so I say the brain. Once the brain gets affected, it is most likely that your body won't function properly if you survive. And about the heart, it is so important but know they have even invented fake hearts.

Answer 8

Vital means alive so without the heart we are no longer vital, so I choose the heart. Although I would not want to be vital without my brain working.

Answer 9

Artificial life support can keep you alive without a heart for an unknown length of time. Your brain is "you." Are you more concerned about your body being alive or "you" being alive? In my opinion I'd rather that "I" be alive and waiting for a heart transplant than me being dead, as in brain dead, and never knowing my organs are harvested to save the lives of others.

Answer 10

the heart the body can live if its brain dead but dies when the heart stops the heart works on its own the brain has no control over it it starts to beat when you are in the womb