This from Slate — now here are a couple of premises for a counter-factual story:
If nothing else, Macmillan says, “Phineas’s story is worth remembering because it illustrates how easily a small stock of facts can be transformed into popular and scientific myth.” Indeed, the myth-making continues today. “Several people have approached me with a view to develop film scripts or plays,” he says. One involved Gage falling in love with a Chilean prostitute who rescues him from a life of dissolution. Another involved Gage returning to the United States, befriending and freeing a slave, then banding together with Abraham Lincoln to win the Civil War.
manwithoutqualities 