Lenin's Brain: A Scientist's Obsession

When Vladimir Lenin died in January 1924, his brain was removed and sliced into over 30,000 sections for scientific study. This episode follows the bizarre, decades-long project led by German neuroscientist Oskar Vogt, who believed that Lenin's genius could be found in his cerebral cortex. We explore the creation of the Moscow Brain Institute, the scientific and ideological pressures on Vogt, the eventual debunking of his claims, and what the study of Lenin's brain reveals about the intersection of science, politics, and personality cult in the early Soviet Union. Featuring the Vogts' trip to Moscow, the brain's preservation in paraffin, the 'convolutions of genius' theory, and the Institute's later fate under Stalin.

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