tagged w/ Neuroscience
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Researchers have used brain scans to study the effects of sexual climax on our minds. Apparently, in women, many parts of the brain just turn off, including the area in charge of pain and another that controls emotion! Men, on the other hand, had almost no reaction.Researchers have used brain scans to study the effects of sexual climax on our minds.... more
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I love this man.
I first picked up "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat" in college, and have greatly admired him ever since. Sacks is credited with enabling laymen such as myself to access some of the hidden mysteries shrouding the inner workings of the human brain in language that is easy to follow and great fun to read.
In his new book, Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, he discusses the cases of the surgeon who was struck by lightning and became obsessed with learning to play the piano; of the musician whose memory was destroyed by disease but who can still play a Bach sonata; and of the countless ways in which the human brain is stimulated, soothed, agitated and sometimes shattered by music.
It is the work of a man who, to borrow Sackss description of the brain, is exquisitely tuned to music. It is written in his signature style filled with quirky charm and compassion, more descriptive than analytic, more lyrical than scientific. The New York Times has called him the poet laureate of medicine.
Did I mention that I love this man?I love this man.
I first picked up "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a... more
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These mice have been genetically modified so that their brains fire
"tracer rounds." As the mice think, fluorescent proteins accumulate
throughout their neural network.
The results are, like the first pictures from the Hubble, stunning.
They look like art (suggestions I got: Pollock, Monet, Klimt,
Kandinsky, Bruce Morrow), and they are art.These mice have been genetically modified so that their brains fire
"tracer... more
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On weed, anyway. Harvard scientists have built a device that enables people to smoke weed AND remain motionless during brain Scans.On weed, anyway. Harvard scientists have built a device that enables people to smoke... more
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Microsoft applied for a patent to monitor user's brain waves to understand how good (or bad) their interfaces are. Filed on August 9, 2007, the patent application, #20070185697, describes a method of classifying EEG data in a way that separates the wheat from the chaff. From the patent application:
When studying how humans interact with computing devices, it is desirable to be able to determine the effectiveness of a computer-user interface, i.e., a user interface. A traditional way of determining the effectiveness of a user interface is to present a computer user, i.e., a user, with a task, observe the user as he or she operates the user interface to complete the task, and ask the user questions before, during, and/or after the task is performed. The observed behavior and answers to the questions are characterized and quantified. The quantified results are analyzed to determine the effectiveness of the user interface.
Cognitive neuroscience techniques can be used to provide a more direct way to determine the effectiveness of user interfaces. A typical cognitive neuroscience technique involves attaching electrical sensors, ie., sensors, to various points on a user's scalp. The sensors are then connected to an electroencephalograph (EEG). One use of an EEG is to sense electrical changes within the brain that correspond to certain brain states. It is possible to determine the effectiveness of a user interface by analyzing a user's brain states before, during, and/or after a user performs a task using the user interface. Microsoft applied for a patent to monitor user's brain waves to understand how... more
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"I experience numbers in a very visual way, using colors, textures, shape and form. Sequences of numbers form landscapes in my mind. It just happens. It's like having a fourth dimension," says Daniel Tammet, a highly functioning autistic savant, who has incredible math, language and memory skills. He can perform mathematical feats of Olympic proportions, has recited Pi from memory up to 22,514 digits for a National Society for Epilepsy charity challenge, yet claims the answers to complex sums come to him visually and spontaneously. Tammet, who has mastered nine languages, learnt Icelandic, a particularly complex language, in a week when the gauntlet was thrown down for this Channel 5 documentary. During the filming Tammet, who lives in Kent, England, was flown to America for tests at San Diego's Center For Brain Studies and to meet fellow savant Kim Peek, the man who inspired Dustin Hoffmans character in the Oscar winning film Rain Man.
From www.dailymantra.com "I experience numbers in a very visual way, using colors, textures, shape and... more
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Radio Lab, from WNYC in New York, is ear-bending and mind-blowing. It's a show about science, but don't think Science Friday: This show is incredibly fast, complicated, layered, and dense -- it's radio for people who have played video games. Or for people whose brains move... faster... than... this.
This episode in particular is riveting -- it's about when language becomes music, and how music has influenced language.Radio Lab, from WNYC in New York, is ear-bending and mind-blowing. It's a show... more
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sloan
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added this
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4 years ago
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Want to start a fight? Propose a theory about what causes autism. The M.I.N.D Institute, at The University of California Davis, is one of the leading centers for research into this baffling condition that leaves many otherwise healthy children with a wide spectrum of neurological afflictions. Now, UCD researchers are looking for markers in pregnant women who already have an autistic child to see if it's detectable in the womb.Want to start a fight? Propose a theory about what causes autism. The M.I.N.D... more
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Even in humdrum nonpolitical decisions, liberals and conservatives literally think differently, researchers show. Conservatives tending towards rote reactions, and liberals tending towards thought-out reactions. Don't shoot the messenger, I'm just sayin'.Even in humdrum nonpolitical decisions, liberals and conservatives literally think... more
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saskia
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added this
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4 years ago
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When one considers a future gain, the brain's rational center is active; when one thinks about an immediate reward, the emotional centers become active. Guess which usually wins? (By the way, if I said or did anything bad on the booze cruise, it wasn't me. It was my faulty brain structure.)When one considers a future gain, the brain's rational center is active; when one... more
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mganek
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added this
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4 years ago
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