Barefoot in the Head

I had to clamp my hands over my mouth and nose and press hard to stop laughing out loud. I had found this source of merriment by chance while looking for something else and could not believe my eyes. Hooting with hysteria in the middle of the British Library is somewhat frowned upon, but all the same, this scientific paper had to be craziest I had ever encountered. Was it a joke? No, it was in a serious journal. It had been cited by other researchers, too.
Jarl Flensmark has discovered the cause of schizophrenia and it’s right under our feet. That’s right, under our feet, because the cause of schizophrenia is shoes! Shoes are the source of all mental disease! Shoes dampen down eccentric contractions of the foot when walking, and this produces tension signals from Golgi tendon organs. Calamity ensues, because the ‘electrical stimulation of the vermis inhibits the limbic structures and increases neurogenesis, and so do the signals from eccentric contractions...’
And, as we all know, the foot bone’s connected to the heel bone and ‘the use of heeled shoes results in less eccentric contractions with decreased neurogenesis.’ Now hear the word of the Lord! We are starving our brains of vital electricity by wearing shoes! As a result we suffer from depression, epilepsia, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, schizophrenia, diabetes, and myopia!
Of course, I wondered for a moment whether this had not been written by a schizophrenic, but no. This is peer-reviewed journal, and this article has been picked up by others. An anti-shoe movement must surely follow.
But there is hope... ‘Bicycle riding reduces depression in schizophrenia due to stronger stimulation by improved lengthening contractions of the triceps surae muscles.’
Was it about a bicycle? The spirit of Myles na Gopaleen was alive and well here. A case for the Third Policeman if ever I heard one!
As I gasped for air and wiped the tears from my eyes, I had a moment of disquiet. What if he was right? I have recently become aware of the Barfuss (or ‘barefoot’) movement and even snipped out an article for a friend on the Trentham Gardens Adventure Barfuss Play-Park.
Perhaps there is something to be said for going unshod, as nature intended.
Is humanity’s ill-judged embracing of heeled shoes a devilish plot by the Dolman-Saxlil Shoe Corporation after all?

(Flensmark’s paper, ‘Physical activity, eccentric contractions of plantar flexors, and neurogenesis: Therapeutic potential of flat shoes in psychiatric and neurological disorders’ is to be found in Medical Hypotheses, Volume 73, Issue Number 2, August 2009, pp 130 - 132)