Freaks, to use a politically incorrect term, are universally fascinating. The conjoined adult twin women, who died last year in Singapore during an operation to separate them, drew global attention as much for their circus appeal as for genuine interest in surgical advancement - that is, until they commanded, by their behaviour and circumstances, a more complex range of feelings among the public. People are at once attracted to and repelled by physical deformity in humans for some of the same reasons they cannot resist looking at a car accident when they pass one. Part of it is 'better them than us', part sheer sensationalism and novelty. But, at a deeper level, we actually seek out the harshest reminders of our fragility - in part to feel our strength. Despite our big brains and unique sense of consciousness, we are only flesh and blood. Seeing deformity or severe injury connects us to that primitive aspect - the one that civilisation does so much to mask. Such spectacles, psychologists of Darwinian persuasion might suggest, push the buttons of our 'old brain' (the part adapted to a more primitive environment) in much the way that basic sex-triggers and violence do. But in the case of the Iranian twins, there was another form of appeal that registered among the public. In the media, it is called 'human interest'. But, in my view, it has more to do with packaging than content. The twins evoked a whole range of questions of the weightiest sort about medical ethics, personal choice, individualism, the sense of self, social concepts of normality and so on - all deserving of serious consideration. Laleh and Ladan Bijani rose above their circus appeal in ways in which past 'freaks' have not. Maybe a couple of centuries ago the sisters, if they survived, would have been condemned to lives as professional freaks. The most famous freak in psychology literature is probably Phineas Gage, a 19th century American railway engineer who lost a sizable clump of brain tissue when a metre-long tamping iron was shot by an explosion clean through his head. Simply surviving this horrendous accident would have been enough to secure his fame. But he also appeared to think and act exactly as he always had for a time, which has made his case a favourite among brain and mind theorists. In time, however, Gage's personality began to 'deteriorate', according to his friends. He ended up as an exhibit in Barnum's freak show before dying 11 years after his accident. Ladan and Laleh, on the other hand, transcended freakdom. They grew up in the spotlight in Iran, having been raised by doctors. The twins learned to make people see past the gruesome aspect of their appearance by commanding their admiration and affection. The initial public fascination may have been about the freakiness of their physical circumstances. But that interest shifted as the public began to get to know more details about their personalities: Ladan, the extroverted, cookery-loving, aspiring lawyer and the quieter Laleh who, unlike her sister, loved animals and had ambitions to be a journalist. How could two people with the same parents and who have never been separate for a single second end up being so very different? Obviously, the theoretical implications for psychiatrists, brain scientists and philosophers are significant. Most impressive of all, perhaps, was the incredible decision the 29-year-olds took to go ahead with an operation that had only a 10 per cent chance of success. From the age of eight, they had yearned to be separate - had even tried to break themselves apart and ended up crying because it hurt so much. They demonstrated an understandable urge to have complete control over one's own body. They appeared to be healthy, cheerful, bright and incredibly well-adapted, considering their burden. Yet, their decision was a clear indication of their misery. It showed, without question, that each woman had independently decided she would rather die than go on as she was. This was established by a series of interviews and counselling sessions with each sister while the other was distracted by music using headphones. The contrast between their good humour and their underlying desperation to be free from each other was one of the reasons they captured the public's imagination. Another, I believe, was their refusal to be relegated to freakdom - a commentary on the women as individuals and perhaps on our time as one in which we admire the impulse not to accept marginalisation. Jean Nicol is a psychologist specialising in issues of cultural identity and change in an era of globalisation everydaypsychologist@yahoo.com