Reviewers may have been offended.вЂќ Another more obvious reason for resistance, of course, is that FlegrвЂ™s notions sound an awful lot like fringe science, right up there with UFO sightings and claims of dolphins telepathically communicating with humans.Д«ut after years of being ignored or discounted, Flegr is starting to gain respectability. вЂњThere is strong psychological resistance to the possibility that human behavior can be influenced by some stupid parasite,вЂќ he says.

And, he believes, his views may invite deep-seated opposition. That вЂњmay be one of the reasons my theory is not better known,вЂќ he says. Because he struggles with English and is not much of a conversationalist even in his native tongue, he rarely travels to scientific conferences.

When you add up all the different ways it can harm us, says Flegr, вЂњ Toxoplasma might even kill as many people as malaria, or at least a million people a year.вЂќДЄn evolutionary biologist at Charles University in Prague, Flegr has pursued this theory for decades in relative obscurity. He also believes that the organism contributes to car crashes, suicides, and mental disorders such as schizophrenia. Healthy children and adults, however, usually experience nothing worse than brief flu-like symptoms before quickly fighting off the protozoan, which thereafter lies dormant inside brain cells-or at least thatвЂ™s the standard medical wisdom.Д«ut if Flegr is right, the вЂњlatentвЂќ parasite may be quietly tweaking the connections between our neurons, changing our response to frightening situations, our trust in others, how outgoing we are, and even our preference for certain scents. gondii is also a major threat to people with weakened immunity: in the early days of the AIDS epidemic, before good antiretroviral drugs were developed, it was to blame for the dementia that afflicted many patients at the diseaseвЂ™s end stage. Since the 1920s, doctors have recognized that a woman who becomes infected during pregnancy can transmit the disease to the fetus, in some cases resulting in severe brain damage or death. gondii or Toxo for short) and is the microbe that causes toxoplasmosis-the reason pregnant women are told to avoid catsвЂ™ litter boxes. The parasite, which is excreted by cats in their feces, is called Toxoplasma gondii ( T. And if it was messing with his mind, he reasoned, it was probably doing the same to others. Starting in the early 1990s, he began to suspect that a single-celled parasite in the protozoan family was subtly manipulating his personality, causing him to behave in strange, often self-destructive ways. A self-described вЂњsloppy dresser,вЂќ the 53-year-old Czech scientist has the contemplative air of someone habitually lost in thought, and his still-youthful, square-jawed face is framed by frizzy red hair that encircles his head like a ring of fire.Д¬ertainly FlegrвЂ™s thinking is jarringly unconventional.

N o one would accuse Jaroslav Flegr of being a conformist.

Scientist parasite game