Brain Stuff

Articles

Link Description
Viagra for the brain The latest brain drug - Provigil (modafinil) - designed for narcolepsy, improves brain power. And a second article on it appears on the same day, reporting same results - Wake up, Little Susie (May 08)
The cost of being smart We'll be extinct before the flies! NYT article about experiments in animal intelligence (May 08)
Does your brain have a  mind of its own? LA Times article - and of course the answer is yes (May 08)
Can you become a creature of new habits NYT article - we can't erase old habits. Rather we create new ones that bypass the old ways. Emerging brain research (May 08)
Warping court memories with subtle suggestions Mind Hacks - demonstrating how the way we interpret information can be altered by the language used to present that information (May 08)
A rattle arond Harvard's baby brain lab Experiments to try and understand how the brain develops in early stages of life - The Telegraph (Apr 08)
Top 10 memory hacks Blog post highlighting ways to boost your memory (Apr 08)
A Digital Life Article in American Scientist, by Gordon Bell and Jim Gemmell, describing the MyLifeBits project and its influence on how we use our memories (Feb 07)
Limits of Rationality: Beware the Paralimbic Cortex Blog post by David Cowan, covering some of the classic economic examples that demonstrate irrational decisions
Dream machines Wired article: How computer games are unleashing the human imagination (April 2006)
Attentional Blink Article in New Scientist, 24th December 2005, describing why advertisers are failing to grab our attention.
The Puppet Master Talk at the Royal Society (Dec 2005) discussing how the brain controls the body
Getting Over It New Yorker article (Nov 2004) by Malcolm Gladwell - why we are bad at forecasting our emotions, and looking to the future is healthier than dwelling on the past
Damaged New Yorker article by Malcolm Gladwell - studies in brain science and links to criminal behaviour
Brain Science and Education Talk by Marja Brandon about why education needs to catch up with developments in our understanding about how the brain works and how we learn

Recommended Books

Perception

"In the tests I've done, about 80 to 90 per cent are 'mad'." - Christopher Frayling, head of the UK's Royal College of Art, on what primary school children draw when asked to depict a scientist (BBC Online, 9 January 2006)

Sites providing examples of optical illusions and tricking the brain:

Brain Waves

Waveband name Frequency (Hz) Associated with
Slow waves below 1 Preparing to move a muscle
Delta waves 1 to 3 Deep sleep
Theta waves 3 to 7 Drowsiness, trance states and early sleep
Alpha waves 7 to 12 Relaxed but awake
Beta waves 12 to 30 Anxious thinking, focused activity and REM sleep
Gamma waves above 30 Learning, memory formation and perception

Source: 'Brainwave boogie-woogie', New Scientist Magazine, 24 December 2005

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