-
Neuroscience Fiction
The New Yorker: In the early nineteen-nineties, David Poeppel, then a graduate student at M.I.T. (and a classmate of mine)—discovered an astonishing thing. He was studying the neurophysiological basis of speech perception, and a new
-
Personality Dynamics Through the Lens of Cognitive Science
With the goal of advancing a cognitive neuroscience of personality dynamics, leading researchers from the United States and Europe gathered in Trieste, Italy on July 10, 2012 to present cutting-edge findings on the neural and
-
Disharmony in the Land of Nod
The most compelling personal memoirs—Tobias Wolff’s This Boy’s Life, Mary Karr’s The Liars’ Club, and others—are not happy stories. They are recollections of childhood adversity, and rarely are they triumphant survivors’ tales. The most honest
-
Solving for X, among the neurons
I have a fence that needs scraping and painting, and I’m pretty sure I can do the whole job in six hours. My friend Jack, who is an experienced painter, wants me to hire him.
-
How to Spot Pseudoneuroscience and Biobunk
When it comes to pseudoscience, social psychologist and writer Carol A. Tavris is a self-appointed curmudgeon. “I have spent many years lobbing hand grenades at psychobabble — that wonderful assortment of pop psych ideas that
-
Math Anxiety Is (Literally) in Your Head
Math can be a fun, logic puzzle for some people. But for others, doing math is a headache-inducing experience. Scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine have recently shown that people who experience math
