Pseudoarchaeology Disseminated: Antiquitist Speculation and a YouTube "Educator"

YouTube clickbait farmer Luke Caverns appeared on some other indoor-hat-wearing podcaster ( #juliandoreypodcast, 1.9K views 8 months ago ) with some junk about "Egyptian's Obsession of Pineal Gland". It's a bit like Demented-Trump-Speak.

[Luke Caverns: 0:05] I mean, it is 100% a fact that our pineal gland which people called like the seat of the Soul, which the Egyptians were well aware of -like you look at the Eye of Ra and the Eye of Horus, it is the same shape as the pineal gland... Have you ever seen this? No, yeah, yeah... So look up, look up the pineal gland, and "Eye of Ra" or "Eye of Horus" ("Horus" is uh spelt h- - o- r- u- s) and [sigh], uh, it's it's very thought... it's thought that.. um... this is done on purpose. You'll see, you'll see it's like uncanny connection between our the pineal gland in our mind (which is where they think that perhaps our soul comes from) [...] let's see, sure, yeah [...] um but on 0:54 the pineal gland there, there's certainly a similarity [...] but there's undoubtedly like some weird similarity there. 

Um, and we know that our modern food and our water is (sic) calcifying the pineal gland, like when when people get, like, when autopsies are performed, uh, especially on, like, G blastomas, which go, like, deep into the brain; cut the brain in half they can see that the pineal gland is calcified. My wife...[host]: Calcified?

[Caverns]: [searching for words] Yeah, yeah, so it's calcified, like it, um.... I don't know the... [waves hands] I'm not you know a medical doctor... but, um... Yeah, something.... something is happening to the pineal gland where it's... like... dying inside the brain, because it comes from water that we drink, cuz it's not happening in other, places in the world.

Uh, my wife she's in medical dental school right now and she [shrugs shoulders] cut a brain in half and saw that, um, so we know that ['accordion hands' gesture]  the water today is calcifying our pineal glands and you know there are theories out there and ['accordion hands' gesture] there's like scant (sic) evidence that that's the seat of the soul and the pineal gland might be our ([air quotes] quote unquote) "antenna" to something else that's out there and the water that we drink dulls down our connection, and has dulled down our connection for... you know, over a hundred years to that, and so people theorize that that could be our antenna. And certainly, it seems like uh the ancient Egyptians knew something significant about the pineal gland or knew that it was significant in some way. They, they had medical doctors; they knew about anatomy...." 

Wow. Definitely the same aimless unstructured self-aggrandising rambling as the senile Donald Trump. Calcified is a pretty common term for when something becomes permeated with calcium (usually) carbonate, like anyone's kettle if they live in a hard water area. It's how many fossils form. General knowledge Mr Caverns. 

                    Wadjet amulets, faience, Quora                              

So when you cut out the crap, Caverns ("has a degree in anthropology") says "the Egyptiand knew about anatomy" and (therefore) would have known about the pineal gland (though Caverns neglects to say under what name it appears in the medical papyri) and (he says - actually some dumbass antiquities collectors [mainly over in the US?] also claim this) the gland "looks like" the dangly bits of the wadjet symbol [that's what it is called, Mr Caverns]. "Therefore" the Ancient Egyptians were "obsessed" with the pineal gland.

That is, in Egyptological parlance, complete bollocks. The connection between the eye of Horus and the pineal gland is a modern speculation not supported by any evidence.

The pineal gland is a tiny, pinenut-shaped (hence the name) gland buried deep in the brain. It is as endocrine gland producing melatonin that has a role in regulating the sleep-wake cycle. The Egyptians did not in fact know much about the anatomy of the brain, in mummification, in order not to damage the shape of the head, if the brain was removed, it was scrambled with a metal tool and pulled and/or rinsed out in bits through the nose. This rather prevented them from getting much of an idea about its anatomy.

                      (Quora)                     

Both Horus and Re were represented inEgyptian iconography as a falcon. The wadjet represents the eye of the god Horus, it symbolized royal power, protection, and good health (the Eye of Re mentioned by Caverns was similar but also different). In mythology there was one legend of how Horus lost his eye while battling with Set and what subsequently happened to it. It takes the form of a stylized human eye, but usually incorporates am eyebrow, a dark line extending behind the rear corner of the eye, a cheek marking below the center or forward corner of the eye, and a line extending below and toward the rear of the eye that ends in a curl or spiral. It is very clear that the cheek marking resembles that found on lanner falcons (Falco biarmicus) 

   Prometheus tortured by the eagle          
  (black-figure kylix,560-550 BC)        
Wikipedia       

But it gets worse. Building on the idea that these Ancient Egyptians had some advanced technology and advanced knowledge, the speaker gets carried away in his search for "interesting titbits" of "information" that will get him invited back again.

And certainly [...] the ancient Egyptians [...], they, they had medical doctors; they knew about anatomy.... when they would torture people, you know, how.... you know, how, um.... when people get liver cancer they can cut off like 80% of the  liver and it'll grow back, did you know that?

[host]: [trying to look pensive] no! 

[Caverns]:  Yeah, so if you get cancer in your liver the reason people can beat it is because they can cut off like 80% of your liver ['accordion hands'] and it will regrow itself [...] it's the only organ in the  body that can do that.
The Egyptians knew that, so when they tortured people, over time they cut out [gleeful smile and scything movement with finger] they cut out half the liver and it grow back, and they cut it out again [gleeful smile and cutting gestures] it grew back and, they'd cut it out again.

[host, gleefully], Oh, ho ho ho ho ho! 

[Caverns]: Yeah, yeah [broad smile], so, um, and I think it can grow back in a year time I think [...]

While the liver does have this ability when conditions are right, there is zero evidence for the practice the young anthropologist confidently, and with such pleasure, states as a fact. I think he's getting confused with the myth of the Titan Prometheus.