Is Technology Producing A Decline In Critical Thinking And Analysis?
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090128092341.htm

816 discussion

ScienceDaily (Jan. 29, 2009) —

Researchers at the University of Rochester have shown that the human brain—once thought to be a seriously flawed decision maker—is actually hard-wired to allow us to make the best decisions possible with the information we are given.

Probability

It's not a pretty picture: a never-ending stream of phone calls, e-mails, instant messages, text messages and tweets is part of an institutionalized culture of interruption, and makes it hard to concentrate and think creatively.

Studies show that information workers now switch tasks an average of every three minutes throughout the day. This degree of interruption is correlated with stress and frustration and lowered creativity.

"Paying attention isn't a simple act of self-discipline, but a cognitive ability with deep neurobiological roots — and this complex faculty, says Maggie Jackson, is being woefully undermined by how we're living. In Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age, Jackson explores the effects of "our high-speed, overloaded, split-focus and even cybercentric society" on attention. It's not a pretty picture: a never-ending stream of phone calls, e-mails, instant messages, text messages and tweets is part of an institutionalized culture of interruption, and makes it hard to concentrate and think creatively. Of course, every modern age is troubled by its new technologies. "The telegraph might have done just as much to the psyche [of] Victorians as the Blackberry does to us," said Jackson. "But at the same time, that doesn't mean that nothing has changed. The question is, how do we confront our own challenges?" Wired.com talked to Jackson about attention and its loss."

yes

The other important thing is to discuss interruption as an environmental question and collective social issue. In our country, stillness and reflection are not especially valued in the workplace. The image of success is the frenetic multitasker who doesn't have time and is constantly interrupted. By striving towards this model of inattention, we're doing ourselves a tremendous injustice.

Wow!

Magenta ain't a colour dude

Magenta isn't a single color on the visible light spectrum: but it exists anyway. With diagrams.

Yes, Virginia, there is a magenta - Ars Technica

In a nutshell, the findings were that “emerging computerized technologies may have physiological effects and potential benefits for middle aged and older adults,” and that “internet searching engages complicated brain activity, which may help exercise and improve brain function.” This is a long way of saying that being online helps keep those little gray cells busy. The level of brain activity was compared to that of reading a book. With internet usage, a significantly bigger piece of neural real estate lit up on the fMRI indicating that more parts of the brain were engaged.

Are our brains being rewired by using the Internet? The evidence tends to be pointing that way.

12 Surprising And Productive Brain Exercises - The Huffington Post

12 interesting exercises from writer/editor Dorothea Brande, who also wrote a book called "Wake Up and Live."

Social network sites risk infantilising the mid-21st century mind, leaving it characterised by short attention spans, sensationalism, inability to empathise and a shaky sense of identity, according to a leading neuroscientist. The startling warning from Lady Greenfield, professor of synaptic pharmacology at Lincoln college, Oxford, & director of the Royal Institution, has led members of the government to admit their work on internet regulation has not extended to broader issues, such as the psychological impact on children.

doodle away folks!

from Tracey Isidro

As if I needed another reason to get 14 hours of sleep every night.

In the sleep-deprived, gruesome images produced 60 per cent more activity in the amygdala - a primitive, emotionally reactive part of the brain - than in well-rested people. // Evidence is growing that sleep - and dreaming, REM sleep, in particular - helps the brain to process memories. Disrupt this mechanism, and you could end up with psychological problems such as PTSD.

IBM has announced it will lead a US government-funded collaboration to make electronic circuits that mimic brains. Part of a field called "cognitive computing", the research will bring together neurobiologists, computer and materials scientists and psychologists. As a first step in its research the project has been granted $4.9m (£3.27m) from US defence agency Darpa.

"The key idea of cognitive computing is to engineer mind-like intelligent machines by reverse engineering the structure, dynamics, function and behaviour of the brain."

IBM has announced it will lead a US government-funded collaboration to make electronic circuits that mimic brains. Part of a field called "cognitive computing", the research will bring together neurobiologists, computer and materials scientists and psychologists. As a first step in its research the project has been granted $4.9m (£3.27m) from US defence agency Darpa.

IBM has announced it will lead a US government-funded collaboration to make electronic circuits that mimic brains.

IBM will join five US universities in an ambitious effort to integrate what is known from real biological systems with the results of supercomputer simulations of neurons. The team will then aim to produce for the first time an electronic system that behaves as the simulations do. The longer-term goal is to create a system with the level of complexity of a cat's brain.

Good introduction to X-phi, as rediculous as it sounds.

Philosophers used to combine conceptual reflections with practical experiment. The trendiest new branch of the discipline, known as x-phi, wants to return to those days. Some philosophers don’t like it.

a new philosophy field? holy moly. really good read.

Philosophers used to combine conceptual reflections with practical experiment. The trendiest new branch of the discipline, known as x-phi, wants to return to those days. Some philosophers don’t like it

Pessoas paralizadas conseguem se comunicar através de eletrodos conectados a um computador. Fantastico!

People who are completely paralyzed due to illness or trauma are getting help communicating with a new technology that connects their brains to a computer. Scott Pelley reports.

DTI is a variant of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) that can measure the structural integrity of the brain's white matter, which is made up of cells that carry nerve impulses from one part of the brain to another. The greater the structural integrity, the faster nerve impulses travel. >Personal Note: I worked with DTI during my internship at the MRRC (Magnetic Resonance Research Center) at Yale University. Our signals looked more similar to the second image except that we didn't have a 3d model extracted from the raw signal (the second one shows a raw DTI signal with an overlay of its 3d model representation).

The smarter the person, the faster information zips around the brain, a UCLA study finds. And this ability to think quickly apparently is inherited. The study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, looked at the brains and intelligence of 92 people. All the participants took standard IQ tests. Then the researchers studied their brains using a technique called diffusion tensor imaging, or DTI. Capturing Mental Speed DTI is a variant of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) that can measure the structural integrity of the brain's white matter, which is made up of cells that carry nerve impulses from one part of the brain to another. The greater the structural integrity, the faster nerve impulses travel. "These images really give you a picture of the mental speed of the brain," says Paul Thompson, Ph.D., a professor of neurology at UCLA School of Medicine. They're also "the most beautiful images of the brain you could imagine," Thompson says. "My daughter, who's 5, says they look like

Smart People Really Do Think Faster http://bit.ly/ey8Db So...that means all us twitter users are wicked smart [from http://twitter.com/AdamPieniazek/statuses/1375120864]

5 Ways Your Brain Is Messing With Your Head. Who can you trust?!

Check this out

market for news that circumvents government control but, as we have found out, rumor mills like to fill inf

The underground world of “neuroenhancing” drugs.

The underground world of "neuroenhancing" drugs.

The underground world of "neuroenhancing" drugs Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

Even if you think you’re pretty smart or have a good memory, your brain is begging you to work it to its full potential. Getting stuck in the same routine, never exercising and eating junk food are all brain killers that decrease good cognitive function and increase your chances of memory loss, dementia and Alzheimer’s. But with these 50 tips and ideas for flexing your brain power, you’ll be able to boost performance right now and in the future.

I can haz higher IQ?

Instead of seeing a single series of items like the one above, test-takers saw two different sequences, one of single letters and one of spatial locations.

Find N-Back test on web

The scene: A rigorous intro-level survey course in biology, history, or economics. You're the instructor, and students are crowding the lectern, pleading for study advice for the midterm. If you're like many professors, you'll tell them something like this: Read carefully. Write down unfamiliar terms and look up their meanings. Make an outline. Reread each chapter. That's not terrible advice. But some scientists would say that you've left out the most important step: Put the book aside and hide your notes. Then recall everything you can. Write it down, or, if you're uninhibited, say it out loud. Two psychology journals have recently published papers showing that this strategy works, the latest findings from a decades-old body of research. When students study on their own, "active recall" — recitation, for instance, or flashcards and other self-quizzing — is the most effective way to inscribe something in long-term memory.

That old study method still works, researchers say. So why don't professors preach it?

The Boston Globe

an interesting article about baby's brain

doodling makes you smarter!

More doodles of infinite awesomeness. Love!

"[The] team asked 40 people to listen to a recording containing the names of people and places. Afterwards the people wrote down the names they could remember. While listening, half of the test subjects were also required to shade in shapes on a piece of paper. Afterwards, they remembered one-third more names than test subjects who didn't doodle while listening. "

Doodling improves concentration

If you want to make the right decisions in confusing times—Time to refinance? Explore a different career? Root for the singing spinster or the 12-year-old?—you need to pay special attention to what you eat. That’s right: Your grocery list can help with your to-do list. That’s because the right foods are a kind of clean-burning fuel for your body’s biggest energy hog: Your brain. A study in the Journal of Physiology makes the point that, though your brain represents only 2 percent of your body weight, it makes 20 percent of the energy demands on your resting metabolism. On our new Eat This, Not That! Web site, we rounded up the best foods to munch on when you need a mental boost—and found studies that show, in fact, that you can be up to 200 percent more productive if you make the right eating choices. Stock up on these items to halt mental decline, jog your memory, sharpen your senses, improve your performance, activate your feel-good hormones, and protect your quick-witted sharpness

It's from Men's Health magazine, so I question its scientific authority (harping on the Thanksgiving tryptophan thing still? pork has more than turkey, thank you), but in general this seems like solid advice.

eriments in an fMRI machine. Carolyn says she will be participating in the sc

Cho chweet: "Footage of these experiments is poignant, as the kids struggle to delay gratification for just a little bit longer. Some cover their eyes with their hands or turn around so that they can’t see the tray. Others start kicking the desk, or tug on their pigtails, or stroke the marshmallow as if it were a tiny stuffed animal."

Summary of EQ, delayed gratification studies.

The secret of self-control. People who are able to delay gratification appear to be more successful in life.

The secret of self-control.

Brain research can help us craft spaces that relax, inspire, awaken, comfort, and heal. By Emily Anthes.

interesting title

Is Google Rewiring Our Brains? http://is.gd/m748 [from http://twitter.com/msdaibert/statuses/1881375194]

Is Google Rewiring Our Brains, very interesting, http://bit.ly/lsRAr [from http://twitter.com/gregbond/statuses/1288562619]

Gord Hotchkiss: Are Our Brains Becoming “Googlized?” http://is.gd/m9nr / Is Google Rewiring Our Brains? http://is.gd/m748 searchengineland [from http://twitter.com/bibliothekarin/statuses/1289466114]

Jeff Hawkins

Jeff Hawkins kertoo aivotutkimuksen teorianmuodostuksesta sekä esittelee parhaan kuulemani älykkyyden määritelmän. Kiva kuullaa miestä, kun on aikoinaan lukenut tämän saman hänen kirjastaan.

Treo creator Jeff Hawkins urges us to take a new look at the brain -- to see it not as a fast processor, but as a memory system that stores and plays back experiences to help us predict, intelligently, what will happen next.

TED talk - currently no theory about how brain works because there is not framework for the theory - The framework is memory and prediction not behavior and computational ability.

The problem with Google, from a design perspective

"The male brain, extreme or not, is compatible with visual design. It allows you to learn every font in the Letraset catalogue and work from a grid. In fact, the male-brain capacity for years-long single-mindedness explains why the heads of large ad agencies and design houses are overwhelmingly male. (It isn’t a sexist conspiracy.)"

Work at Google? (Via Daring Fireball: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2009/04/27/clark-google ).

The latest research suggests a more prosaic, democratic, even puritanical view of the world. The key factor separating geniuses from the merely accomplished is not a divine spark. It’s not I.Q., a generally bad predictor of success, even in realms like chess. Instead, it’s deliberate practice. Top performers spend more hours (many more hours) rigorously practicing their craft.

Genius - The Modern View

IQ persistence and success

"The key factor separating geniuses from the merely accomplished is not a divine spark. It’s not I.Q., a generally bad predictor of success, even in realms like chess. Instead, it’s deliberate practice. Top performers spend more hours (many more hours) rigorously practicing their craft."

Don't let the cats get to your head.

Kevin Lafferty is a smart, cautious, thoughtful scientist who doesn't hate cats, but he has put forth a provocative theory that suggests that a clever cat parasite may alter human cultures on a massive scale.

Research has shown that women who are infected with the parasite tend to be warm, outgoing and attentive to others, while infected men tend to be less intelligent and probably a bit boring. But both men and women who are infected are more prone to feeling guilty and insecure.

Virtual Body Site in both Spanish and English

An online resource that provides a virtual tour of the human body.

Something to think about when you wonder if you “see” reality.

So we’re forced to realize a very interesting conclusion. The wavelength of a photon certainly reflects a color – but we cannot produce every color the human eye sees by a single photon of a specific wavelength. There is no such thing as a pink laser – two lasers must be mixed to produce that color. There are “real” colors (we call them pure spectral or monochromatic colors) and “unreal” colors that only exist in the brain.

While we consider this rather trivial today, at the time you’d be laughed out of the room if you suggested this somehow illustrated a fundamental property of light and color. The popular theory of the day was that color was a mixture of light and dark, and that prisms simply colored light. Color went from bright red (white light with the smallest amount of “dark” added) to dark blue (white light with the most amount of “dark” added before it turned black).

"Tricks work only because magicians know, at an intuitive level, how we look at the world," says Macknik, lead author of the paper. "Even when we know we're going to be tricked, we still can't see it, which suggests that magicians are fooling the mind at a very deep level." By reverse-engineering these deceptions, Macknik hopes to illuminate the mental loopholes that make us see a woman get sawed in half or a rabbit appear out of thin air even when we know such stuff is impossible. "Magicians were taking advantage of these cognitive illusions long before any scientist identified them," Martinez-Conde says.

GReader: Magic and the Brain: Teller Reveals the Neuroscience of Illusion http://ow.ly/5xUu [from http://twitter.com/ChipRiley/statuses/1725035126]

Retweeting @copyblogger: Penn & Teller Reveal the Neuroscience of Illusion - http://is.gd/vRUV [from http://twitter.com/apoorvgadwal/statuses/1698147950]

""People take reality for granted," Teller says shortly before stepping onstage. "Reality seems so simple. We just open our eyes and there it is. But that doesn't mean it is simple." For Teller (that's his full legal name), magic is more than entertainment. He wants his tricks to reveal the everyday fraud of perception so that people become aware of the tension between what is and what seems to be. Our brains don't see everything—the world is too big, too full of stimuli."

RT @diannagraf: RT @drtiki Want to get ahead? Sleep in http://bit.ly/Op41P @JonathanStrahan don't get up before me in Tas, that's just wrong [from http://twitter.com/meika/statuses/1665793930]

"Smug early birds take note: Night owls actually have more mental stamina than those who awaken at the crack of dawn, according to new research."

RT @jontybrook: Finally! Science confirms that late sleepers are more productive: http://ping.fm/KqtBS (via @tferriss) <- YAY! [from http://twitter.com/danphilpott/statuses/1715473753]

This is an interesting article, but it leaves way too many gaps. Does it measure productivity by hours awake?

"A group of Spanish researchers reported today in Science that they may have stumbled upon a substance that could become the ultimate memory-enhancer. The group was studying a poorly-understood region of the visual cortex. They found that if they boosted production of a protein called RGS-14 (pictured) in that area of the visual cortex in mice, it dramatically affected the animals' ability to remember objects they had seen. Mice with the RGS-14 boost could remember objects they had seen for up to two months. Ordinarily the same mice would only be able to remember these objects for about an hour. The researchers concluded that this region of the visual cortex, known as layer six of region V2, is responsible for creating visual memories. When the region is removed, mice can no longer remember any object they see."

Imagine if you could look at something once and remember it forever. You would never have to ask for directions again. Now a group of scientists has isolated a protein that mega-boosts your ability to remember what you see.

nifty!

I'm not staring into space, I'm trying to live a balanced life

Everyone who knows me needs to read this article

science technology

Memristors... The 6th missing basic electronic factor..

Bio computers

Nw1AS.jpg (JPEG-kuva, 950×848 kuvapistettä)

ganzfeld procedure, inverted binoculars painkiller, rubber hand illusion, pinocchia illusion, purkinje lights

"Systems on the edge of chaos are said to be in a state of "self-organised criticality". These systems are right on the boundary between stable, orderly behaviour - such as a swinging pendulum - and the unpredictable world of chaos, as exemplified by turbulence... Brain scans used to map the connections between regions of the human brain discovered that they form a "small-world network" - exactly the right architecture to support self-organised criticality. Small-world networks lie somewhere between regular networks, where each node is connected to its nearest neighbours, and random networks, which have no regular structure but many long-distance connections between nodes at opposite sides of the network. Small-world networks take the most useful aspects of both systems. In places, the nodes have many connections with their neighbours, but the network also contains random and often long links between nodes that are very far away from one another. It's the perfect compromise."

Do ideas sometimes pop into your head from, it seems, nowhere? Yes, and it’s because your brain actually operates on the edge of chaos. In fact, your brain is like a pile of sand, but don't worry: that's why it has such remarkable powers

The neurological assessment of the benefits of swearing. Also, researchers found that when we swear too much, the words lose the power of emotion.

via http://habrahabr.ru/blogs/popular_science/65236/

BBC NEWS | Technology | Artificial brain '10 years away' http://nm14b.tk [from http://twitter.com/stevepuma/statuses/2802534611]

a newly invented technology for an artificial brain will be available in the market 10 years away.

Blue Brain project says within 10 years we can have a fully functional replica of the human brain.

Content Type: text/html

"abstract thinking makes it easier for people to form surprising connections between seemingly unrelated concepts"

blah blah

Psychology

Why is this no big surprise? "EVER wondered why the pundits who failed to predict the current economic crisis are still being paid for their opinions? It's a consequence of the way human psychology works in a free market, according to a study of how people's self-confidence affects the way others respond to their advice."

good stuff

the auditory illusions are interesting!

New Scientist's guide to the simple techniques that will uncover the inner workings of your grey matter

Forty of the best psychology blogs, chosen to give you a broad sweep of the most interesting content being produced online right now. The list is split

40 Superb Psychology Blogs

Cover the basics of speed reading fast!

This post is a condensed overview of principles I taught to undergraduates at Princeton University in 1998 at a seminar called the “PX Project”. The below was written several years ago, so it’s worded like Ivy-Leaguer pompous-ass prose, but the results are substantial. In fact, while on an airplane in China two weeks ago, I helped Glenn McElhose increase his reading speed 34% in less than 5 minutes. I have never seen the method fail. Here’s how it works…

So, you think you can multitask?

This game is rad.

this is the most exciting game ever. no. really.

"Think you can handle multiple games at once? See just how coordinated you are."

hyperthymestic syndrome,

This piece blew my mind.

Researchers had never found a subject with a perfect memory — then along came Jill Price.

a mulher que não esquece nada

The woman remembers dates to the day. Amazing. But know few quizzers who can do the same.

How the brain hard-wires us to love Google, Twitter, and texting. And why that's dangerous.

brain research and new social media

by Emily Yoffe. Summary of research by Jaak Panskeep and Kent Berridge into our desire for additional information. Speculates this desire is akin to addiction systems. "How the brain hard-wires us to love Google, Twitter, and texting. And why that's dangerous."

"The dopamine system does not have satiety built into it," Berridge explains. "And under certain conditions it can lead us to irrational wants, excessive wants we'd be better off without." So we find ourselves letting one Google search lead to another, while often feeling the information is not vital and knowing we should stop. "As long as you sit there, the consumption renews the appetite," he explains. Actually all our electronic communication devices—e-mail, Facebook feeds, texts, Twitter—are feeding the same drive as our searches. Since we're restless, easily bored creatures, our gadgets give us in abundance qualities the seeking/wanting system finds particularly exciting. Novelty is one. Panksepp says the dopamine system is activated by finding something unexpected or by the anticipation of something new. If the rewards come unpredictably—as e-mail, texts, updates do—we get even more carried away. No wonder we call it a "CrackBerry."

Well worth the read http://bit.ly/J9ctr [from http://twitter.com/JacksonATL/statuses/3385969448]

If humans are seeking machines, we've now created the perfect machines to allow us to seek endlessly. This perhaps should make us cautious.

Seeking. You can't stop doing it. Sometimes it feels as if the basic drives for food, sex, and sleep have been overridden by a new need for endless nuggets of electronic information. We are so insatiably curious that we gather data even if it gets us in tr

In several benchmark tests of focus, college students who routinely juggle many flows of information, bouncing from e-mail to web text to video to chat to phone calls, fared significantly worse than their low-multitasking peers.

Some people suspect that a multitasking lifestyle has changed how they think, leaving them easily distracted and unable to concentrate even when separated from computers and phones. Their uneasiness may be justified. In several benchmark tests of focus, college students who routinely juggle many flows of information, bouncing from e-mail to web text to video to chat to phone calls, fared significantly worse than their low-multitasking peers.

Two scientists suggest that depression is not a malfunction, but a mental adaptation that brings certain cognitive advantages

"Two scientists suggest that depression is not a malfunction, but a mental adaptation that brings certain cognitive advantages"

[Multitaskers are] "suckers for irrelevancy. Everything distracts them." "They couldn't help thinking about the task they weren't doing," Ophir said. "The high multitaskers are always drawing from all the information in front of them. They can't keep things separate in their minds."

You might think a lot gets done when you multitask, but a study conducted by Stanford researchers Eyal Ophir, Clifford Nass and Anthony Wagner says it isn't so.

People who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information do not pay attention, control their memory or switch from one job to another as well as those who prefer to complete one task at a time, a group of Stanford researchers has found.

Humans don’t always make the most rational decisions. As studies have shown, even when logic and reasoning point in one direction, sometimes we chose the opposite route, motivated by personal bias or simply "wishful thinking." This paradoxical human behavior has resisted explanation by classical decision theory for over a decade. But now, scientists have shown that a quantum probability model can provide a simple explanation for human decision-making - and may eventually help explain the success of human cognition overall.

Need to read more carefully; till then, count me as skeptical

LOL. The first few sentences made me think of Busemeyer, even before he was mentioned.

Gullibility on the rise? Count me in!

2009-08-24

Saturday 05 September 2009 | Health News feed | All feeds

Another pellet, please

Ever find yourself sitting down at the computer just for a second to find out what other movie you saw that actress in, only to look up and realize the search has led to an hour of Googling? Thank dopamine. Our internal sense of time is believed to be controlled by the dopamine system.

p. 2 is the fun bit.

How the internet impacts our thinking

Men and women have very different ways of arguing. So, in a better effort to help couples understand each other (which, really, is what we're all about here at Maxim), we decided to break down the thought process of both a man and woman, during an argument.

Sometimes it's hard to understand where your boyfriend or girlfriend is coming from in an argument, and why they're saying what they're saying.  Let us be your guide on this journey...

Sometimes it's hard to understand where your boyfriend or girlfriend is coming from in an argument, and why they're saying what they're saying. Let us be your guide on this journey...

Is it you pachamama?

I'm not actually sure what this is -- links to a bunch of related NPR stories, I guess. But it looks interesting.

More than half of adult Americans report they have had a spiritual experience that changed their lives. Now, scientists from universities like Harvard, Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins are using new technologies to analyze the brains of people who claim they have touched the spiritual — from Christians who speak in tongues to Buddhist monks to people who claim to have had near-death experiences. Hear what they have discovered in this controversial field, as the science of spirituality continues to evolve.

More than half of adult Americans report they have had a spiritual experience that changed their lives. Now, scientists from universities like Harvard, Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins are using new technologies to analyze the brains of people who claim they have touched the spiritual — from Christians who speak in tongues to Buddhist monks to people who claim to have had near-death experiences. Hear what they have discovered in this controversial field, as the science of spirituality continues to evolve.

Lehrer is interested in the historic dichotomy between "emotional" decision-making and "rational" decision-making and what modern neuroscience can tell us about these two modes of thinking. One surprising and compelling conclusion is that people who experience damage to the parts of their brain responsible for emotional reactions are unable to decide, because their rational mind dithers endlessly over the possible rational reasons for each course of action. The Platonic ideal of a rational being making decisions without recourse to the wordless gut-instinct is revealed as a helpless schmuck who can't answer questions as basic as "White or brown toast?"

Much of the brain is still mysterious to modern science, possibly because modern science itself is using brains to analyze it. There are probably secrets the brain simply doesn't want us to know. But by no means should that stop us from tinkering around in there, using somewhat questionable and possibly dangerous techniques to make our brains do what we want. We can't vouch for any of these, either their effectiveness or safety. All we can say is that they sound awesome, since apparently you can make your brain...

Dumb Little Man shares ideas to make the everyday person more productive in life. Expect to read tips on finance, saving money, business, and some DIY for the house.

PickTheBrain

Resources to help make you somewhat smarter. This should be interesting...

BRAIN ... HowTo be BETTER

"mind"

This weeks Sunday Siesta has been postponed as I have been working all weekend on this article. It’s my longest article ever at over 4500 words but I think it was worth the time and the effort.

Neuroscience

this is good to hear.

When things don’t add up, the mind goes into high gear.

Studie: Absurditäten rütteln die Sinne wach.

This is really interesting.

Offensive Play How different are dogfighting and football? by Malcolm Gladwell

The effect of football on the human brain is stomach-turning.

“I remember, every season, multiple occasions where I’d hit someone so hard that my eyes went cross-eyed, and they wouldn’t come uncrossed for a full series of plays. You are just out there, trying to hit the guy in the middle, because there are three of them. You don’t remember much. There are the cases where you hit a guy and you’d get into a collision where everything goes off. You’re dazed. And there are the others where you are involved in a big, long drive. You start on your own five-yard line, and drive all the way down the field—fifteen, eighteen plays in a row sometimes. Every play: collision, collision, collision. By the time you get to the other end of the field, you’re seeing spots. You feel like you are going to black out. Literally, these white explosions—boom, boom, boom—lights getting dimmer and brighter, dimmer and brighter.

Hyvä video optisista harhoista.

TED Talk, fascinating as always...

TED presentation on optical illusions - explanation that they are not failures of the senses, but simply the brain taking empirical and historical data it has gathered from other experiences that have been useful and analyzing data it receives. TL;DR - information has only the meaning we give it.

Writing and reading — from newspapers to novels, academic reports to gossip magazines — are migrating ever faster to digital screens, like laptops, Kindles and cellphones.

Is there a difference in the way the brain takes in or absorbs information when it is presented electronically versus on paper? Does the reading experience change, from retention to comprehension, depending on the medium?

Whether you're a college student studying for an important test or an aging baby boomer concerned about forgetting a recent doctor's appointment, there are a few things everyone can do to optimize the storage and checkouts in our private libraries of memories.

Here are 10 simple ways to improve your memory. Read our list of ways to improve your memory and learn to make those memories stick.

"People remember things better, longer, if they are given very challenging tests on the material, tests at which they are bound to fail. In a series of experiments, they showed that if students make an unsuccessful attempt to retrieve information before receiving an answer, they remember the information better than in a control condition in which they simply study the information."

People remember things better, longer, if they are given very challenging tests on the material, tests at which they are bound to fail. In a series of experiments, they showed that if students make an unsuccessful attempt to retrieve information before receiving an answer, they remember the information better than in a control condition in which they simply study the information. Trying and failing to retrieve the answer is actually helpful to learning.

"People remember things better, longer, if they are given very challenging tests on the material, tests at which they are bound to fail. In a series of experiments, they showed that if students make an unsuccessful attempt to retrieve information before receiving an answer, they remember the information better than in a control condition in which they simply study the information. Trying and failing to retrieve the answer is actually helpful to learning. It’s an idea that has obvious applications for education, but could be useful for anyone who is trying to learn new material of any kind."

Reminded me that asking questions BEFORE reading the chapter is a better way to prepare students for learning.

chess

One Simple Mental Exercise to improve your Mind Power — Chess Blog

Nature vs Nurture

David Brooks on why genius is created through deliberate practice.

"The key factor separating geniuses from the merely accomplished is not a divine spark. It’s not I.Q., a generally bad predictor of success, even in realms like chess. Instead, it’s deliberate practice. Top performers spend more hours (many more hours) rigorously practicing their craft."

The differences between rational thinking and intelligence.

Is George W. Bush stupid? It's a question that occupied a good many minds of all political persuasions during his turbulent eight-year presidency. The strict answer is no. Bush's IQ score is estimated to be above 120, which suggests an intelligence in the top 10 per cent of the population. But this, surely, does not tell the whole story. Even those sympathetic to the former president have acknowledged that as a thinker and decision-maker he is not all there. Even his loyal speechwriter David Frum called him glib, incurious and "as a result ill-informed".

the

kes sense to you, the best thing you can do now is creating your learning log. It doesn’t need to be perfect, a

Learn how to remember things you learn.

How we, as creative people, can harness this understanding of the left and right brain to be more creative, as well as succeed in other work-related tasks.

The concept of the left and right brain only lately popped up in the late 1960's, but since has become a well-known part of human psychology. While we all

Researchers at Princeton University recently made a remarkable discovery about the brains of rats that exercise. Some of their neurons respond differently to stress than the neurons of slothful rats...

rats that had exercised, even if they had received the oxidizing chemical, were relatively nonchalant under stress. When placed in the unfamiliar space, they didn’t run for dark corners and hide, like the unexercised rats. They insouciantly explored. The “cells born from running,” the researchers concluded, appeared to have been “specifically buffered from exposure to a stressful experience.” The rats had created, through running, a brain that seemed biochemically, molecularly, calm.

Other researchers have looked at how exercise alters the activity of dopamine, another neurotransmitter in the brain, while still others have concentrated on the antioxidant powers of moderate exercise. Anxiety in rodents and people has been linked with excessive oxidative stress, which can lead to cell death, including in the brain. Moderate exercise, though, appears to dampen the effects of oxidative stress. In an experiment led by researchers at the University of Houston and reported at the Society for Neuroscience meeting, rats whose oxidative-stress levels had been artificially increased with injections of certain chemicals were extremely anxious when faced with unfamiliar terrain during laboratory testing. But rats that had exercised, even if they had received the oxidizing chemical, were relatively nonchalant under stress. When placed in the unfamiliar space, they didn’t run for dark corners and hide, like the unexercised rats. They insouciantly explored.

Amazing.

In the past year, researchers have developed technology that makes it possible to use thoughts to operate a computer, maneuver a wheelchair or even use Twitter — all without lifting a finger. But as neural devices become more complicated — and go wireless — some scientists say the risks of “brain hacking” should be taken seriously.

scientists say the risks of “brain hacking” should be taken seriously.

you know...we really should call it 'Ghost-hacking'...

RT @wiredscience: The next target for hackers could be your brain. http://is.gd/1svMA [from http://twitter.com/reinikainen/statuses/2557678128]

Computer security for prosthetics http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/07/neurosecurity/ [from http://twitter.com/JacksonATL/statuses/2621731930]

Yawn It’s one of the best things you can do for your brain.

It’s one of the best things you can do for your brain.

"My advice is simple. Yawn as many times a day as possible: when you wake up, when you’re confronting a difficult problem at work, when you prepare to go to sleep, and whenever you feel anger, anxiety, or stress. Yawn before giving an important talk, yawn before you take a test, and yawn while you meditate or pray because it will intensify your spiritual experience."

News from UC Berkeley

In a study recently accepted for publication by the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, scientists at UC Berkeley's Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute and the School of Public Health report that normal 9- and 10-year-olds differing only in socioeconomic status have detectable differences in the response of their prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that is critical for problem solving and creativity.

EEGs show brain differences between poor and rich kids

By Robert Sanders, Media Relations | 02 December 2008

"The virus behind cold sores is a major cause of the insoluble protein plaques found in the brains of Alzheimer's disease sufferers, University of Manchester researchers have revealed."

s disease puts out the welcome mat for the virus that

The virus behind cold sores is a major cause of the insoluble protein plaques found in the brains of Alzheimer's disease sufferers, University of Manchester researchers have revealed. They believe the herpes simplex virus is a significant factor in developing the debilitating disease and could be treated by antiviral agents such as acyclovir, which is already used to treat cold sores and other diseases caused by the herpes virus. Another future possibility is vaccination against the virus to prevent the development of the disease in the first place. The team discovered that the HSV1 DNA is located very specifically in amyloid plaques: 90% of plaques in Alzheimer's disease sufferers' brains contain HSV1 DNA, and most of the viral DNA is located within amyloid plaques. The team had previously shown that HSV1 infection of nerve-type cells induces deposition of the main component, beta amyloid, of amyloid plaques.

Simple list about what is good for brain, nothing new, but good round up.

Mahamritunjay Mantra

Broad-based MIT project aims to reinvent AI for a new era. By going back and fixing mistakes, researchers hope to produce ‘co-processors’ for the human mind.

ai

Proyecto del MIT que busca rescatar algunas investigaciones en inteligencia artificial de hace 50 años, para conformar nuevo proyecot MMP

"This time, they are determined to get it right — and, with the advantages of hindsight, experience, the rapid growth of new technologies and insights from the new field of computational neuroscience, they think they have a good shot at it."

生活の原点をつくる―脳を活性化させる朝の過ごし方。足・手・口をよく動かそう。：散歩など軽い運動／部屋の片付け／料理／ガーデニング／挨拶＋一言／音読10分程度。 集中力を高める―生活のどこかに「試験を受けている状態」を持とう。：仕事の区切り毎に時間制限を設ける。 睡眠の意義―夜は情報を蓄える時間。睡眠中の「整理力」を利用しよう。：夜の勉強は中途半端で止め、起きてから整理すると効果的。 脳の持続力を高める―家事こそ「脳トレ」。雑用を積極的にこなそう。：雑用は前頭葉の持久力を高めてくれる。 問題解決能力を高める―自分を動かす「ルール」と「行動予定表」をつくろう。書類整理のルール、予定表などで脳が一度に扱う量を整理する。 思考の整理―忙しいときほど「机の片付け」を優先させよう。：物の整理は思考の整理に通じている。 注意力を高める―意識して目をよく動かそう。耳から情報を取ろう。：目で立体的な情報を捉えたり、耳だけで情報を吸収すると脳が活性化される。 記憶力を高める―「報告書」「まとめ」「ブログ」を積極的に書こう。：入力→情報処理→出力。 話す力を高める―メモや写真などを手がかりにして、長い話を組み立てよう。：質問によって話しは長くさせることが出来る。 表現を豊かにする―「たとえ話」を混ぜながら、相手の身になって話そう。：ありそうな質問を考えれば、話しを膨らませることが出来る。 脳を健康に保つ食事―脳のためにも、適度な運動と「腹八分目」を心がけよう。：食事制限以前にまずは動くこと。そして消費する以上に摂取しないこと。 脳の健康診断―定期的に画像検査を受け、脳の状態をチェックしよう。：MRやPET検査を受ける。 脳の自己管理―「失敗ノート」を書こう。自分の批判者を大切にしよう。：小さな失敗、人から受けた注意を書き留める。 創造力を高める―ひらめきは「余計なこと」の中にある。活動をマルチにしよう。：アイディアを生み出すポイントは、誰のためになるのかを考えること、アイディアを組み合わせること、思い付きを書き出しながら考えること。 意欲を高める―人を好意的に評価しよう。時にはダメな自分を見せよう。：褒め上手な人は観察力が優れている。 番外編：高次脳機能ドックの検査―最低限の脳機能を衰えさせていないか確認しよう。

How to concentrate and get rid of distractions

From better eating and lifestyle habits we become radically healthier, more potent and with improved genes

there's hope. you are not your genes

Screw ups, disasters, misfires, flops. Why losing big can be a winning strategy.

"There are advantages to thinking on the margin. When we look at a problem from the outside, we’re more likely to notice what doesn’t work. Instead of suppressing the unexpected, shunting it aside with our 'Oh shit!' circuit and Delete key, we can take the mistake seriously. A new theory emerges from the ashes of our surprise."

"This is why other people are so helpful: They shock us out of our cognitive box."

Over the past few decades, psychologists have dismantled the myth of objectivity. The fact is, we carefully edit our reality, searching for evidence that confirms what we already believe. Although we pretend we’re empiricists — our views dictated by nothing but the facts — we’re actually blinkered, especially when it comes to information that contradicts our theories. The problem with science, then, isn’t that most experiments fail — it’s that most failures are ignored.

Article about the messiness of science, its failures and how an “in vivo” investigation that attempted to learn from the messiness of real experiments -

Recently, researchers have found even more positive news. The brain, as it traverses middle age, gets better at recognizing the central idea, the big picture. If kept in good shape, the brain can continue to build pathways that help its owner recognize patterns and, as a consequence, see significance and even solutions much faster than a young person can. The trick is finding ways to keep brain connections in good condition and to grow more of them. “The brain is plastic and continues to change, not in getting bigger but allowing for greater complexity and deeper understanding,” says Kathleen Taylor, a professor at St. Mary’s College of California, who has studied ways to teach adults effectively. “As adults we may not always learn quite as fast, but we are set up for this next developmental step.” [via xeks]

“As adults we have these well-trodden paths in our synapses,” Dr. Taylor says. “We have to crack the cognitive egg and scramble it up. And if you learn something this way, when you think of it again you’ll have an overlay of complexity you didn’t have before — and help your brain keep developing as well.”

Annotated link http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2010%2F01%2F03%2Feducation%2Fedlife%2F03adult-t.html%3Fem

Jack Mezirow, a professor emeritus at Columbia Teachers College, has proposed that adults learn best if presented with what he calls a “disorienting dilemma,” or something that “helps you critically reflect on the assumptions you’ve acquired.”

Memory tips

When things don’t add up, the mind goes into high gear.

Blacketer sent this to me

Are you a digital native?

article about iBrain book - changes in brain due to technology

leading neuroscientist says processing digital information can rewire your circuits. But is it evolution?

Technology Use and Our Brains

Brain Games: Play Free Puzzle Games Online, Free Puzzles

Blogean txertatzeko joku desberdinak, sudokuak, zopa letrak...

Crear tus propios puzzles y otros juegos personalizados para incrustar en tu blog/web.

Proprofs – Juegos para ejercitar la memoria y la agilidad mental

What is the hardest language?

n all dem anglophones

Frankly it's amazing that anyone learns any language. Maybe Esperanto wasn't such a bad idea after all.

In search of the world's hardest language

You know how important it is to boost your brain power. Increasingly, the world requires more smarts. If you can think fast, think well and remember things, you have an edge, whether it’s in the job market or just staying on top of your game. If you want to make your brain stronger and faster, though, you have to give it a good workout. Just like everything else, how you use your brain can make a big difference in the results you get. Here are 55 tips that can make your brain stronger and faster:

"A recent study by Walker and his colleagues examined how rest - specifically, rapid eye movement (REM) sleep - influences our ability to read emotions in other people's faces." does sleep promote brain acuity? can lack of sleep explain social deviations? are autistic people counted into this study?

"Adequate sleep may underpin our ability to understand complex emotions properly in waking life." Research suggests that sleep-deprived people are more-sensitive to negative emotions such as anger and fear. "With little mental energy to spare, you're emotionally more attuned to things that are likely to be the most threatening in the immediate moment. Inversely, when you're well rested, you may be more sensitive to positive emotions, which could benefit long-term survival." So if you're not sleeping, and you're feeling a little on-edge, there's your reason why...

Rich, Black, Flunking Cal Professor John Ogbu thinks he knows why rich black kids are failing in school. Nobody wants to hear it. By Susan Goldsmith May 21, 2003 Chris Duffey John Ogbu has been compared to Clarence Thomas, denounced by the Urban League, and criticized in The New York Times. Amy Weiser It wasn’t socioeconomics, school funding, or racism that accounted for the students' poor performance, Ogbu says; it was their own attitudes, and those of their parents. Chris Duffey Lionel Fluker John McWhorter believes academia too readily blames white people. The black parents wanted an explanation. Doctors, lawyers, judges, and insurance brokers, many had come to the upscale Cleveland suburb of Shaker Heights specifically because of its stellar school district. They expected their children to succeed academically, but most were performing poorly. African-American students were lagging far behind their white classmates in every measure of academic success: grade-point average, stand

John Ogbu attributes more of the responsibility for the achievement gap to Black people than other academics do.

Ogbu's work on the black middle class in Shaker Heights OH

Drinking five cups of coffee a day could reverse memory problems seen in Alzheimer's disease, US scientists say.

The Florida research, carried out on mice, also suggested caffeine hampered the production of the protein plaques which are the hallmark of the disease.

Older news, but I finally got around to reading it. Interesting piece on the importance of color.

In the latest and most authoritative study on color's cognitive effects, test subjects given attention-demanding tasks did best when primed with the color red. Asked to be creative, they responded best to blue.

Math Run - how fast is your brain? A simple Brain Training Game for everyone

"...thinking fast made participants feel more elated, creative and, to a lesser degree, energetic and powerful."

thinking and happiness. Annotated link http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sciam.com%2Farticle.cfm%3Fid%3Drapid-thinking-makes-people-happy

Rapid Thinking Makes People Happy

Results like these suggest that feeling good about yourself may in part be a matter of having a hard time feeling bad, and that confidence and even success might be triggered by interventions that do nothing but make failure seem the more intimidating possibility. The human brain, for all its power, is suspicious of difficulty, but perhaps we can learn to use that.

Phrases that are easier on the ear aren’t just catchy and easy to remember, McGlone argues, they also feel inherently truer.

Annotated link http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.boston.com%2Fbostonglobe%2Fideas%2Farticles%2F2010%2F01%2F31%2Feasy__true%2F%3Fpage%3Dfull

in any situation where we weigh information. It’s a key part of the puzzle of how feelings like attraction and belief and suspicion work

"Cognitive fluency is simply a measure of how easy it is to think about something, and it turns out that people prefer things that are easy to think about to those that are hard. On the face of it, it’s a rather intuitive idea. But psychologists are only beginning to uncover the surprising extent to which fluency guides our thinking, and in situations where we have no idea it is at work."

Cognative fluency

...mirror neurons fire when you merely watch another person perform a similar act. It's as if the neuron (more strictly the network of which the neuron is part) was using the visual input to do a sort of "virtual reality simulation" of the other person's actions—allowing you to empathize with her and view the world from her point of view.

Brain stuff from VS Ramachandran

Ramachandran - recent piece (Jan. 09) on what various bizarre neurological disorders might imply about the self.

Is this what Antony is saying when he writes about Epilepsy? "Now imagine these same circuits become hyperactive as sometimes happens when you have seizures originating in the temporal lobes (TLE or temporal lobe epilepsy). The result would be an intense heightening of the patient's sensory appreciation of the world and intense empathy for all beings to the extent of seeing no barriers between himself and the cosmos—the basis of religious and mystical experiences. (You lose all selfishness and become one with God.) Indeed many of history's great religious leaders have had TLE. My colleague, the late Francis Crick, has suggested that TLE patients as well as priests may have certain abnormal transmitters in their brains that he calls "theotoxins"."

We all suffer occasional lapses in memory. Some people suffer severe neurological conditions, such as Alzheimer's, that rob them of their ability to form memories or remember recent events. Three new studies shed light on the way the brain forms, stores and retrieves memories. Experts say they could have implications for people with certain mental disorders.

The underground world of neuroenhancing drugs. Such is the zeitgeist.

Brain Gain ?

using mind enhancing drugs to improve performance

The underground world of “neuroenhancing” drugs.

Review of "Rapt" by Winifred Gallagher -- focuses on the culture of distraction

For the focused life, forget multitasking and try meditating.

The book’s theme, which Ms. Gallagher chose after she learned she had an especially nasty form of cancer, is borrowed from the psychologist William James: “My experience is what I agree to attend to.”

Zen Habits

With just a few weeks of training, you can learn to “see” objects in the dark using echolocation the same way dolphins and bats do. Ordinary people with no special skills can use tongue clicks to visualize objects by listening to the way sound echoes off their surroundings, according to acoustic experts at the University of Alcalá de Henares in Spain.

*

I need to try this!!

wired = weird

Ordinary people with no special skills can use tongue clicks to visualize objects by listening to the way sound echoes off their surroundings, according to acoustic experts at the University of Alcalá de Henares in Spain.

On Feb. 14 I awaken to this headline: "Professor Beaten to Death by Autistic Son." I scan the story while standing, my coffee forgotten. Trudy Steuernagel, a faculty member in political science at Kent State, has been murdered and her 18-year-old son, Sky, has been arrested and charged with the crime, though he is profoundly disabled and can neither speak nor understand. Sky, who likes cartoons and chicken nuggets, apparently lost control and beat his mother into a coma. He was sitting in jail when she died. This happens to be two days after my older son's 21st birthday, which we marked behind two sets of locked steel doors. I'm exhausted and hopeless and vaguely hung over because Andrew, who has autism, also has evolved from sweet, dreamy boy to something like a golem: bitter, rampaging, full of rage. It happened no matter how fiercely I loved him or how many therapies I employed. Now, reading about this Ohio mother, there is a moment of slithering nausea and panic followed immedia

a mother's story of her violent autistic son

about a woman whose autistic son is violent

READ THIS

finally they take a step or two towards the truth

So this freaking article has been showing up all over delicious for weeks, and I didn't save it when I read it, but since it's everywhere I'd like to officially say: NO. WHETHER OR NOT IT IS AN EVOLUTIONARY ADVANTAGE, RIGHT NOW THERE IS NO REASON TO GO THROUGH LIFE MISERABLE, NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOUR PROBLEM-SOLVING OR WHATEVER IS IMPROVED. NO NO NO. Unless the *fate of the entire human population rests in your hands*, you should NOT STAY MISERABLE.

The persistence of this affliction — and the fact that it seemed to be heritable — posed a serious challenge to Darwin’s new evolutionary theory. If depression was a disorder, then evolution had made a tragic mistake, allowing an illness that impedes reproduction — it leads people to stop having sex and consider suicide — to spread throughout the population. For some unknown reason, the modern human mind is tilted toward sadness and, as we’ve now come to think, needs drugs to rescue itself.

While there has been endless speculation about Darwin’s mysterious ailment — his symptoms have been attributed to everything from lactose intolerance to Chagas disease — Darwin himself was most troubled by his recurring mental problems. His depression left him “not able to do anything one day out of three,” choking on his “bitter mortification.” He despaired of the weakness of mind that ran in his family. “The ‘race is for the strong,’ ” Darwin wrote. “I shall probably do little more but be content to admire the strides others made in Science.”

This insight is the jumping-off point of Dr. Wolfram's glossy 1,263-page book, ''A New Kind of Science,'' published a month ago by Dr. Wolfram himself to the accompaniment of articles comparing Dr. Wolfram to Isaac Newton.

A New Kind of Science

simples rules and algorithms define nature, not complex ones

"You might expect the child to plan for the future, think 'OK it's cold outside so the jacket will keep me warm.' But what we suggest is that this isn't what goes on in a 3-year-old's brain. Rather, they run outside, discover that it is cold, and then retrieve the memory of where their jacket is, and then they go get it."

A detailed simulation of a small region of a brain built molecule by molecule has been constructed and has recreated experimental results from real brains. "It starts to learn things and starts to remember things. We can actually see when it retrieves a memory, and where they retrieved it from because we can trace back every activity of every molecule, every cell, every connection and see how the memory was formed."

A detailed simulation of a small region of a brain built molecule by molecule has been constructed and has recreated experimental results from real brains.

It's a matter of if society wants this. If they want it in 10 years, they'll have it in 10 years.

advances

"I get satisfaction out of seeing stuff that makes real change in the real world. We need a lot more of that and a lot less abstract stuff."

TED Talks Temple Grandin, diagnosed with autism as a child, talks about how her mind works -- sharing her ability to "think in pictures," which helps her solve problems that neurotypical brains might miss. She makes the case that the world needs people on the autism spectrum: visual thinkers, pattern thinkers, verbal thinkers, and all kinds of smart geeky kids.

Temple Grandin's remarkable TED talk just posted (must see): http://bit.ly/cQzRtp – Michael Shermer (michaelshermer) http://twitter.com/michaelshermer/statuses/9588688450

an autistic lady talks about her expereinces

Older people are better at solving problems, because they have more mental information to draw upon than younger people do. That's why those in their 50s and 60s are sage. They're the ones we turn to for the best advice, the ones we want to run our companies and our country.

"If you just repeat something again and again that requires your young child to prepare for something in advance, that is not likely to be effective," Munakata said. "What would be more effective would be to somehow try to trigger this reactive function. So don't do something that requires them to plan ahead in their mind, but rather try to highlight the conflict that they are going to face. Perhaps you could say something like 'I know you don't want to take your coat now, but when you're standing in the yard shivering later, remember that you can get your coat from your bedroom."

Toddlers listen, they just store the information for later use.

Toddlers listen, they just store the information for later use, a new study finds."What would be more effective would be to somehow try to trigger this reactive function. So don't do something that requires them to plan ahead in their mind, but rather try to highlight the conflict that they are going to face. Perhaps you could say something like 'I know you don't want to take your coat now, but when you're standing in the yard shivering later, remember that you can get your coat from your bedroom."

Sleep may be a way to sweep out the brain and get it ready for a new day of building connections between neurons, according to two new studies of fruit flies. The studies support the controversial theory that sleep weakens or entirely dissolves some synapses, the connections between brain cells. “We assume that if this is happening, it is a major function, if not the most important function, of sleep” [Science News], says Chiara Cirelli, a coauthor of the first study, published in Science.

Smart people are good if you need to do a lot of really hard things, and we did a lot of really hard things. But it's not all upside. For one thing, smart people tend to systematically overestimate the value of being smart. In fact, it is really valuable, but they still tend to weight it too heavily compared to other virtues you might also value, such as consistency, focus, attentiveness to the emotional needs of your customers, and so on. One of the problems with really smart people is that they can talk themselves into anything. And often they can talk you into it with them. And if you're smart yourself, you can talk them into stuff. The tendency to drift and lack of focus can be really extreme unless you have a few slower people in the group to act as a kind of intellectual ballast.

interesting insight into people and psychology

future of health

Learn about the frontiers of human health from seven of Stanford's most innovative faculty members. Inspired by a format used at the TED Conference (http://www.ted.com), each speaker delivers a highly engaging talk in just 10-20 minutes about his or her research. Learn about Stanford's newest and most exciting discoveries in neuroscience, bioengineering, brain imaging, psychology, and more.

7 youtube videos from Stanford University

amazing advances in brain studies

Critical of Paul MacLean

“So-called lower animals, such as fish, reptiles and birds, display a startling array of cognitive capabilities. Goldfish, for instance, have shown they can negotiate watery mazes similar to the way rats do in intelligence tests in the lab…”

# Despite cartoons you may have seen showing a straight line of fish emerging on land to become primates and then humans, evolution is not so linear. The brains of other animals are not merely previous stages that led directly to human intelligence. # Instead—as is the case with many traits—complex brains and sophisticated cognition have arisen multiple times in independent lineages of animals during the earth’s evolutionary history. # With this new understanding comes a new appreciation for intelligence in its many forms. So-called lower animals, such as fish, reptiles and birds, display a startling array of cognitive capabilities. Goldfish, for instance, have shown they can negotiate watery mazes similar to the way rats do in intelligence tests in the lab.

Brain-Twitter

Adam Wilson posted on twitter "SPELLING WITH MY BRAIN." No keyboards, just a red cap fitted with electrodes that monitor brain activity, hooked up to a computer flashing letters on a screen. Wilson sent the messages by concentrating on the letters he wanted to "type," then focusing on the word "twit" at the bottom of the screen to post the message.

(CNN)

Adam Wilson posted two messages on Twitter on April 15. The first one, "GO BADGERS," might have been sent by any University of Wisconsin-Madison student cheering for the school team.

i

RT @andrea_r @sherina: WOW. http://xrl.in/22to <= Twitter direct from the brain, right here in my hometown! (Telepathy, here we come!) [from http://twitter.com/CircleReader/statuses/1594935657]

Brain-Twitter project offers hope to paralyzed patients: http://bit.ly/pDt8i (via my Dad) [from http://twitter.com/sherrymain/statuses/1604887892]

RT @sherina: WOW. http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/22/twitter.locked.in/index.html { AMAZING } [from http://twitter.com/andrea_r/statuses/1594843677]

:| (Also, wait, poverty-influenced stress can affect... your genes? Erm, what?)

"To test their hypothesis, Evans and Schamberg analyzed the results of their earlier, long-term study of stress in 195 poor and middle-class Caucasian students, half male and half female. In that study, which found a direct link between poverty and stress, students' blood pressure and stress hormones were measured at 9 and 13 years old. At 17, their memory was tested. Given a sequence of items to remember‚ teenagers who grew up in poverty remembered an average of 8.5 items. Those who were well-off during childhood remembered an average of 9.44 items. So-called working memory is considered a reliable indicator of reading, language and problem-solving ability — capacities critical for adult success. When Evans and Schamberg controlled for birth weight, maternal education, parental marital status and parenting styles, the effect remained. When they mathematically adjusted for youthful stress levels, the difference disappeared."

Does being poor make you physically less intelligent?

Growing up poor isn't merely hard on kids. It might also be bad for their brains. A long-term study of cognitive development in lower- and middle-class students found strong links between childhood poverty, physiological stress and adult memory.

supertitious, crowd, asking for help, familiarity breeds contempt, Mondays, pets, right ear

Many fascinating insights into the human mind are hidden in the most routine activities.

Aggregation of pop-psychology articles

Good insightful articles on practical psychology

psychology blog article

池谷裕二、移動/電車

■「淡蒼球」を動かす4つのスイッチ 　[B] Body　カラダを動かす 　[E] Experience　いつもと違うことをする 　[R] Reward　ごほうびを与える 　[I] Ideomotor　なりきる

「どうやって脳とつきあっていくか」ってなんかネストしてるみたいでおもしろい表現

日曜日の朝、平日より遅く起きていませんか？ 起床のリズムを崩すことはおすすめできません。

Annotated link http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fzasshi.news.yahoo.co.jp%2Farticle%3Fa%3D20090413-00000301-president-bus_all

進化の過程を思い出してください。脳とカラダのどちらが先に発達したか。もちろんカラダです。カラダのない動物はいませんが、脳のない動物はいくらでもいます。脳は進化の歴史では新参者なのです。「楽しいから笑う」のではなく「笑うから楽しい」、「やる気が出たからやる」のではなく「やるからやる気が出る」のです。

Report on flexibility in the future after 30 not really occurring.

“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; but remember that what you now have was once among the things only hoped for.”

“The shortest path to oneself leads around the world.”

NOOO I'M ALREADY 21 MUST SELF-ACTUALIZE BEFORE I GET SET IN MY WAYS.

Scientific American: Millions of us dream of transforming our lives, but few of us are able to make major changes after our 20s. Here's why

personality changes occur well past the age of 30 but that typically these changes are small in magnitude compared with the changes that occur between the ages of 20 and 40.

Looking at a sexy photo of my wife "activated part of your 'new brain' that represents the sensation of touch in your genital area,"

For me, translating love into biology is actually kind of reassuring. Yes, it takes away some of the mystery — but also the fear. Think of it like a drug: If you're high and feel like you're sliding off the face of the earth, you can tell yourself, Hey, I'm having a horrible chemical reaction, but I'll get over it. I will stabilize.

'Brain decline' begins at age 27 Concentration Mental abilities decline at a relatively young age, experts suspect Mental powers start to dwindle at 27 after peaking at 22, marking the start of old age, US research suggests. Professor Timothy Salthouse of the University of Virginia found reasoning, spatial visualisation and speed of thought all decline in our late 20s.

Mental powers start to dwindle at 27 after peaking at 22, marking the start of old age, US research suggests.

Thought that your mental prime years were in your thirties? Think again: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7945569.stm [from http://twitter.com/mpondu/statuses/1340264706]

An overview of a study on the shape of our learning. I suppose it is no mistake that tertiary education systems follow the curve. "A seven-year study (published in the journal Neurobiology of Aging) reveals the average age at which the top performance was achieved as 22 in nine out of the 12 tests given. The first age at which there was any marked decline was at 27 in tests of brain speed, reasoning and visual puzzle-solving ability. Things like memory stayed intact until the age of 37, on average, while abilities based on accumulated knowledge, such as performance on tests of vocabulary or general information, increased until the age of 60."

Six more years to go before I get the dumb.

Thanks to the listener who sent me this link.

"And when the surface is scratched, what you find below is extraordinary - or, rather, extraordinarily difficult to make good, clear sense of. Lying in wait are arguments that lead to, if not sheer lunacy, then bullets we're loathe to bite."

Consider a photo of someone you think is you eight years ago. What makes that person you? You might say he she was composed of the same cells as you now. But most of your cells are replaced every seven years. You might instead say you're an organism, a particular human being, and that organisms can survive cell replacement - this oak being the same tree as the sapling I planted last year.

good fora.tv video w/ tan le of emotiv and a live demonstration of the epoc

Tan Le, co-founder and president of Emotiv Systems, gives a live demo of a mind control device that uses a person's thoughts to input computer commands.EG is the celebration of the American entertainment industry. Since 1984, Richard Saul Wurman has created extraordinary gatherings about learning and understanding. EG is a rich extension of these ideas - a conference that explores the attitude of understanding in music, film, television, radio, technology, advertising, gaming, interactivity and the web - The Entertainment Gathering

Tan Le, co-founder and president of Emotiv Systems, gives a live demo of a mind control device that uses a person's thoughts to input computer commands.

Whether or not God exists, thinking about Him or Her doesn't require divinely dedicated neurological wiring. Instead, religious thoughts run on brain systems used to figure out what other people are thinking and feeling. The findings, based on brain scans of people contemplating God, don't explain whether a propensity for religion is a neurobiological accident. But at least they give researchers a solid framework for exploring the question. "In a way, this is a very cold look at religious belief," said National Institutes of Health cognitive scientist Jordan Grafman, co-author of a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "We're only trying to understand where in the brain religious beliefs seem to be modulated."

Whether or not God exists, thinking about Him or Her doesn't require divinely dedicated neurological wiring.

"In a way, this is a very cold look at religious belief," said National Institutes of Health cognitive scientist Jordan Grafman, co-author of a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "We're only trying to understand where in the brain religious beliefs seem to be modulated."

Whether or not God exists, thinking about Him or Her doesn't require divinely dedicated neurological wiring. Instead, religious thoughts run on brain systems used to figure out what other people are thinking and feeling. The findings, based on brain scans of people contemplating God, don't explain whether a propensity for religion is a neurobiological accident. But at least they give researchers a solid framework for exploring the question.

In research published recently in Neuron, Marcos Frank, PhD, Assistant Professor of Neuroscience, at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, postdoctoral researcher Sara Aton, PhD, and colleagues describe for the first time how cellular changes in the sleeping brain promote the formation of memories.

The key cellular player is the molecule N-methyl D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR), which acts like a combination listening post & gate-keeper. It both receives extracellular signals in the form of glutamate & regulates the flow of calcium ions into cells. Once the brain is triggered to reorganize its neural networks in wakefulness (by visual deprivation, eg), intra- & intercellular communication pathways engage, setting a series of enzymes into action w/in the reorganizing neurons during sleep. To start the process, NMDAR is primed to open its ion channel after the neuron has been excited. The ion channel then opens when glutamate binds to the receptor, allowing calcium into the cell. In turn, calcium, an intracellular signaling molecule, turns other downstream enzymes on and off. Some neural connections are strengthened as a result of this process, & the result is a reorganized visual cortex. &, this only happens during sleep.

If you ever argued with your mother when she told you to get some sleep after studying for an exam instead of pulling an all-nighter, you owe her an apology, because it turns out she's right. And now, scientists are beginning to understand why.

In research published recently in Neuron, Marcos Frank, PhD, Assistant Professor of Neuroscience, at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, postdoctoral researcher Sara Aton, PhD, and colleagues describe for the first time how cellular changes in the sleeping brain promote the formation of memories. ... "We find that the biochemical changes are simply not happening in the neurons of animals that are awake," Frank says. "And when the animal goes to sleep it's like you’ve thrown a switch, and all of a sudden, everything is turned on that's necessary for making synaptic changes that form the basis of memory formation. It's very striking." The team used an experimental model of cortical plasticity – the rearrangement of neural connections in response to life experiences. "That's fundamentally what we think the machinery of memory is, the actual making and breaking of connections between neurons,” Frank explains

Sleeping on a problem really can help solve it, say scientists who found a dreamy nap boosts creative powers. They tested whether "incubating" a problem allowed a flash of insight, and found it did, especially when people entered a phase of sleep known as REM. [Excerpt, click on the link to read the rest of this article.]

Sleeping on a problem really can help solve it, say scientists who found a dreamy nap boosts creative powers. They tested whether "incubating" a problem allowed a flash of insight, and found it did, especially when people entered a phase of sleep known as REM. Volunteers who had entered REM or rapid eye movement sleep - when most dreams occur - were then better able to solve a new problem with lateral thinking.

We propose that REM sleep is important for assimilating new information into past experience to create a richer network of associations for future use. They tested whether "incubating" a problem allowed a flash of insight, and found it did, especially when people entered a phase of sleep called REM sleep.

The study at the University of California San Diego showed that the volunteers who entered REM during sleep improved their creative problem solving ability by almost 40%.

"We found that, for creative problems you've already been working on, the passage of time is enough to find solutions. "However for new problems, only REM sleep enhances creativity."

What a long, strange trip it's been!

Nicholas Carr: The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains

The book excerpt: the Shallows

Scientists say juggling e-mail, phone calls and other incoming information can change how people think and behave. They say our ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information. These play to a primitive impulse to respond to immediate opportunities and threats. The stimulation provokes excitement — a dopamine squirt — that researchers say can be addictive. In its absence, people feel bored. The resulting distractions can have deadly consequences, as when cellphone-wielding drivers and train engineers cause wrecks. And for millions of people like Mr. Campbell, these urges can inflict nicks and cuts on creativity and deep thought, interrupting work and family life.

Scientists say our ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information from e-mail and other interruptions.

How (and Why) to Stop Multitasking - Peter Bregman - Harvard Business Review http://bit.ly/d43fuV

against you.

During a conference call with the executive committee of a nonprofit board on which I sit, I decided to send an email to a client. I know, I know. You'd think I'd have learned. Last week I wrote about the dangers of using a cell phone while driving. Multitasking is dangerous. And so I proposed a way to stop.

ation of an imag

RT @HoagiesGifted: 'Thirst for knowledge' may be opium craving http://bit.ly/YHoJP [from http://twitter.com/bfwriter/statuses/14961074185]

BBC News | Creativity is akin to insanity, say scientists who have been studying how the mind works.

Article on creativity and how the minds mimic schizophrenia. Interesting about education and the mind.

That thin line between genius and madness is now verified by science.

Mind Over Mass Media http://ping.fm/Y9SGX

Steven Pinker - Accomplished people don’t bulk up their brains with intellectual calisthenics; they immerse themselves in their fields. Novelists read lots of novels, scientists read lots of science.

Mind Over Mass Media http://nyti.ms/b4IVOC | Twitter, e-mail and PowerPoint are far from making us stupid — they are keeping us smart.

The effects of consuming electronic media are also likely to be far more limited than the panic implies. Media critics write as if the brain takes on the qualities of whatever it consumes, the informational equivalent of “you are what you eat.”

RT @kenanmalik: The Internet does not make you stupid any more than an encyclopaedia makes you smart: http://nyti.ms/d3LP6f

The Anosognosic’s Dilemma: "Existence is elsewhere." — André Breton, The Surrealist Manifesto | http://ow.ly/21xM1 [from http://twitter.com/avivao/statuses/16753976754]

The Anosognostic's Dilemma. Errol Morris, Dunning

Dunning

... just like patience

lazy or exhausted?

This made me wonder if story telling (or writing) is just helping others get as much out of your imagination as you do.

Our main leisure activity is, by a long shot, participating in experiences that we know are not real. When we are free to do whatever we want, we retreat to the imagination—to worlds created by others, as with books, movies, video games, and television (over four hours a day for the average American), or to worlds we ourselves create, as when daydreaming and fantasizing. The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education

"Beliefs are attitudes that we hold in response to how things are. Aliefs are more primitive. They are responses to how things seem. In the above example, people have beliefs that tell them they are safe, but they have aliefs that tell them they are in danger."

"First, fictional people tend to be wittier and more clever than friends and family, and their adventures are usually much more interesting. I have contact with the lives of people around me, but this is a small slice of humanity, and perhaps not the most interesting slice. My real world doesn't include an emotionally wounded cop tracking down a serial killer, a hooker with a heart of gold, or a wisecracking vampire. As best I know, none of my friends has killed his father and married his mother. But I can meet all of those people in imaginary worlds."

The Pleasures of Imagination - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education http://goo.gl/c7t8 [from http://twitter.com/dcouturepdx/statuses/16164664745]

the speed with which we can follow the trail of an idea, or discover new perspectives on a problem, has increased by several orders of magnitude. We are marginally less focused, and exponentially more connected.

“THE point of books is to combat loneliness,” David Foster Wallace observes near the beginning of “Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself,” David Lipsky’s recently published, book-length interview with him.

is it good or bad?

It’s no accident that most of the great scientific and technological innovation over the last millennium has taken place in crowded, distracting urban centers. The printed page itself encouraged those manifold connections, by allowing ideas to be stored and shared and circulated more efficiently. One can make the case that the Enlightenment depended more on the exchange of ideas than it did on solitary, deep-focus reading. Quiet contemplation has led to its fair share of important thoughts. But it cannot be denied that good ideas also emerge in networks.

many great ideas that have advanced culture over the past centuries have emerged from a more connective space, in the collision of different worldviews and sensibilities, different metaphors and fields of expertise. (Gutenberg himself borrowed his printing press from the screw presses of Rhineland vintners, as Mr. Carr notes.)

If you happen to be reading the book on the Kindle from Amazon, Mr. Wallace’s observation has an extra emphasis: a dotted underline running below the phrase. Not because Mr. Wallace or Mr. Lipsky felt that the point was worth stressing, but because a dozen or so other readers have highlighted the passage on their Kindles, making it one of the more “popular” passages in the book.

AJ Jacobs: My colossal task burden - loved this article! http://bit.ly/bcwvQx

Is multi-tasking bad for you? As somebody who suffers from a chronic butterfly mind, I do wonder whether becoming a a 'uni-tasker' wouldn't be a bad idea. A thought provoking and amusing read.

As a counterpoint to the NYTimes article, AJ Jacobs on his experiment living life with no multitasking http://bit.ly/bhMVL9

When AJ Jacobs learned multitasking was bad for you, he decided to kick his chronic addiction to mental juggling. Get ready for Operation Focus…

motion induced blindness, optical illusion, rotating array, yellow dots, green dot

i agree 100% on the following One of the more embarrassing and self-indulgent challenges of our time is the task of relearning how to concentrate. The past decade has seen an unparalleled assault on our capacity to fix our minds steadily on anything. To sit still and think, without succumbing to an anxious reach for a machine, has become almost impossible.

A brief post by Alain de Botton about fasting from cultural consumption.

... @ City Journal. "Our minds, no less than our bodies, require periods of fasting."

Curiously, boldly short comment on distraction: "The need to diet, which we know so well in relation to food, and which runs so contrary to our natural impulses, should be brought to bear on what we now have to relearn in relation to knowledge, people, and ideas. Our minds, no less than our bodies, require periods of fasting."

The obsession with current events is relentless. Our minds need to go on a diet - by Alain de Botton

@ale_benevides Yes, we probably need to go on a "diet" and change our relation to knowledge, people, and ideas http://ow.ly/1Zjzc

By Patricia Curtis Can't remember where you put your glasses? Blanked on your new colleague's name? "Forgetting these types of things is a sign of how busy we are," says Zaldy S. Tan, MD, director of the Memory Disorders Clinic at…

About how Dunnung-Kroeger began as a theory

picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone who values the depth, rather than just the velocity, of human thought. People who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate and focused manner.

Find information on wellness, diet, fitness, weight loss, mental health, anti-aging, conditions & diseases, drugs & medications, and more on Yahoo! Health

Setting your mind on a goal may be counterproductive. Instead think of the future as an open question.

Willingness is a core concept of addiction recovery programs—and a paradoxical one. Twelve-step programs emphasize that addicts cannot will themselves into healthy sobriety—indeed, that ego and self-reliance are often a root cause of their problem. Yet recovering addicts must be willing. That is, they must be open to the possibility that the group and its principles are powerful enough to trump a compulsive disease.

I'm not totally sure that I understand the conclusions the the scientist came to about goal setting, but I'm interested in figuring out what it means and how to apply it to more effective goal setting...

"Setting your mind on a goal may be counterproductive. Instead think of the future as an open question."

Setting your mind on a goal may be counterproductive. Instead think of the future as an open question

People with wondering minds completed significantly more anagrams than did those with willful minds. In other words, the people who kept their minds open were more goal-directed and more motivated than those who declared their objective to themselves.

will i

Tan Le: A headset that reads your brainwaves

Tan Le's astonishing new computer interface reads its user's brainwaves, making it possible to control virtual objects, and even physical electronics, with mere thoughts (and a little concentration). She demos the headset, and talks about its far-reaching applications.

The early stages of neural HCI.