Category Archives: Neuroscience and Psychology

Four techniques Navy Seals use to make it through rigorous training

The training for Navy Seals is extremely tough. For instance, recruits have to stay underwater for 20 minutes. They have a hose to breath from, but they have to deal with regular attacks from instructors who rip their masks off, … Continue reading

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The Meaning of Pupil Dilation

From The Scientist magazine, a really interesting roundup about pupil diliation and what it can tell us about human cognition. It’s an old subject, but finding many new applications and helping create new insights (no pun intended). The Meaning of … Continue reading

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Inherited Resistance to Cocaine

Male rat pups of cocaine using fathers are less likely to become addicted to cocaine and find the drug less rewarding, according to new research. This is due to inherited, epigenetic changes induced by the cocaine use. “The findings, published … Continue reading

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Exercise protects the brain

Yet more evidence that exercise protects the brain against inevitable (but delayable) decline.  

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Does exercise make you more or less hungry?

The NYTimes has a short entry about research on this question, which is one that has interested me for a while. Do people feel hungrier or less hungry after exercise (and why)? I have long been curious about his and … Continue reading

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The link between imagination, sickle cell anemia and human success

On a beach run this morning I was listening to the Fresh Air interview with Jonah Lehrer, author of the book Imagine, which discusses how we get creative insights. Lehrer’s ideas about the nature of the creative process made me … Continue reading

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Sleep and nighttime awakening

Here is an article from the BBC on the naturally bimodal sleep patterns that predominated before artificial lighting kept people up late. A pretty good review, although it doesn’t mention that this was most common in the winter, when people … Continue reading

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Exercise and the brain

This article from the NY Times talks about research showing that regular exercise helps the brain store glycogen, which can then be broken down to provide extra brain power when needed. This may help people who are in shape think … Continue reading

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Making and unmaking memories

Wire has a very good article on understanding memory and the potential for softening or eliminating traumatic memories. This is a subject I have written on before and is really fascinating. I think people focus on the “pill to fix … Continue reading

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Human machine interface comes of age

All new technologies find their greatest promoters in sex and war. A Guardian article about interesting report out of the UK here about mind/machine interface and brain hacking. Here is a tidbit I found most interesting: brain scanning shows that when … Continue reading

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