The events of the past week have raised even more questions about what in the world is wrong with the President of the United States. His credibility, his judgment, his mental stability have all come into question.
One group of mental health professionals, calling itself Duty to Warn, has gone public with its belief that Donald Trump is seriously mentally ill, and may, in fact, have a significant personality disorder.
Professionals have written about evidence that Trump has a language disorder, or Attention Deficit Disorder, or early onset dementia.
This writer has another observation to share, one that is likely to bring up more speculation about the guy in the Oval Office.
I’ve been looking closely at photos of the President’s face. I’ve enlarged a whole bunch of them, and I’ve noticed that in the majority, Trump’s pupils are dilated.
Given the fact that most of the close up photos of Trump are taken in brightly lit places (his various rallies, TV interviews, etc), it’s striking to note how wide open his pupils appear in the majority of the pictures that have been reviewed.
What might this mean?
Scientific American says that the constriction or dilation of a person’s pupils can be related to how much light is hitting the eye. When a person is standing it bright light, on a beach, or in a TV studio, the pupils are usually constricted. Like a camera lens, the idea is to limit the amount of light coming in.
The article also states that our pupils change size based on our state of arousal. If a person is sexually aroused, the pupils dilate. Anxiety gives people the feeling that they are in danger. That causes pupils to dilate, as well.
But it’s also true that when a person is involved in a difficult mental task, something that requires intense concentration, the pupils become enlarged and dilated. One study showed that the more intelligent a person is, the less the pupils dilate.
So, we can speculate about why Trump’s eyes are dilating so much. Perhaps he is really happy and excited when he’s in front of a crowd. Or perhaps he’s anxious and afraid. It could even be both.
Maybe the task of speaking spontaneously, or the difficult task of reading a script, are intellectually challenging to our President. Maybe the enlarging of his pupils shows something about his intelligence.
There is, of course, one other common reason for dilated pupils.
A lot of drug users walk around with pupils either severely constricted or very dilated. Marijuana and cocaine are known to make pupils dilate. So can the drug Propecia, which Donald Trump uses to fight baldness.
Please go look at a whole bunch of Trump closeups. Enlarge them and look at those eyes. Think what you will, speculate all you’d like.
There’s something a little weird there.
Featured image (Photo11: JIM LO SCALZO, EPA-EFE)
