WHY are we thinking so much about thinking these days? Near the top of best-seller lists around the country, you’ll find Jonah Lehrer’s “Imagine: How Creativity Works,” followed by Charles Duhigg’s book “The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business,” and...

Speaking a second language can change everything from problem-solving skills to personality – almost as if you are two people   Cognitive enhancement is just the start. According to some studies, my memories, values, even my personality, may change depending on which language I happen...

In this lecture for Westmont College’s series titled “Beyond Two Cultures: The Sciences as Liberal Arts,” string theorist Jim Gates offers his thoughts on the complementary natures of science and the liberal arts — and how the human mind formulates “systems of belief” in both...

Spooky quantum entanglement just got spookier. Entanglement is a weird statewhere two particles remain intimately connected, even when separated over vast distances, like two die that must always show the same numbers when rolled. For the first time, scientists have entangled particles after...

When it comes to stimulating creativity, brainstorming is one of the least efficient methods. The idea behind Groupthink models is that creativity and achievement requires other people. Lone geniuses are out, and collaboration is in. Society is snuffing out the potential of introverts –...

I just came back from a jazz festival at Katy High School in Texas that show-cased student stage bands from ten schools mostly near Houston, but some as far away as Beaumont and Brownsville (the latter band stole the show). The festival was also a teaching event, with each band or ensemble...

Being online does change your brain, but so does making a cup of tea. A better question to ask is what parts of the brain are regular internet users using.   This modern age has brought with it a new set of worries. As well as watching our weight and worrying about our souls, we now have...

Using Cognitive Science to Unleash Your Hidden Creativity   Everybody has their own pet theory about how to generate ideas and be productive: some chug caffeine, others relax; some work in groups, others work alone; some work at night, others in the morning. This blog draws from recent...

Investigating what is right or wrong often leads one into territory demarcated as a No-Man’s Land, to places forbidden, to territory thought too harsh, horrible or “dangerous” to explore. I am not smart enough to be a discoverer of these countries, but more a cartographer, mapping out...

The problem isn’t in failing, it’s the mindset. Mindset is changeable, and by changing one mindset, one will be able to ratchet up his success faster than he ever thought possible.   Carol Dweck, a professor at Stanford, has spent her life studying the two learning mindsets:...

Too much of a good thing … positive feelings can lead to hasty judgments and stagnation The happier you are, the better, right? Not necessarily. Studies show there is a darker side to feeling good and the pursuit of happiness can sometimes make you … well, less happy. Too much...

Eric Kandel is a titan of modern neuroscience. He won the Nobel Prize in 2000 not simply for discovering a new set of scientific facts (although he has discovered plenty of those), but for pioneering a new scientific approach. As he recounts in his memoir In Search of Memory, Kandel...

What our sense connectedness has to do with the osmosis of rationality and intuition   “Some of the most creative leaps ever taken by the human mind are decidedly irrational, even primal. Emotive forces are what drive the greatest artistic and inventive expressions of our species. How...

Amid the squawks and pings of our digital devices, the old-fashioned virtues of reading novels can seem faded, even futile. But new support for the value of fiction is arriving from an unexpected quarter: neuroscience. Brain scans are revealing what happens in our heads when we read a detailed...

Blade Runner and the Phillip K. Dick novel that it’s based on have as one of their central themes the philosophically intriguing idea of “implanted” memories. That is, androids “born” days ago could have years and years of memories implanted in them about their lives – lives which...

Exploring the role of social media in perpetuating the culture of fear.  How do those using social media leverage fear?  How is fear spread through social media?  When and where can technology combat fear?  What are the social costs of that fear? 1. We live in a culture of fear. 2. The...

Neil McLachlan says he wants to do for music what Apple did for the personal computer. For over two decades, the scientist, artist and university professor has worked to increase music participation. “Only five per cent of people (in the West) who go through tertiary music education end up...

“Society has a cultural bias towards extroverts.” – Susan Cain   Susan Cain is a former lawyer who quit Wall Street to write a book about how society is geared around extroverts at the expense of introverts and the wider economy. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a...

You probably don’t know what the Alcubierre warp drive is, but that’s cool. This is called the Learnin’ Corner for a reason—to pick up where our poorly-funded public education system petered to a halt in your life, and quell your eager and absorbent mind with obscure knowledge that you...

Richard Branson launches journeys to the centre of the Earth through Virgin Volcanic. Academy Award winning actor Tom Hanks to join first expedition. Only 500 people have been to space, only three people have been to the bottom of the ocean, but no one has ever attempted to journey to the...

Energy is a fundamental necessity for life, let alone a vigorous society or civilization. This fact has been recognized by humans for a very long time — Sun, Wind, Fire and Water (in the form of rivers and waterfalls and rain), worshipped by most cultures, are manifestations of energy in one...

People are often unaware of their own ‘headline thinking’ and have not yet developed the ability to see past it The language one uses both indicates and influences the way one thinks. Without at least recognizing one’s own tendency to engage in ‘headline thinking’ — and...

Eastern Europe isn’t known as a mecca for healthy living. Those who haven’t visited Eastern Europe might still imagine that it’s filled with smoking teenagers and obese babushkas. Although that still exists, Eastern Europeans have some healthy practices that we could all learn from. For...

Scientists have used a laser to create magnetic fields similar to those thought to be involved in the formation of the first galaxies; findings that could help to solve the riddle of how the Universe got its magnetism. Magnetic fields exist throughout galactic and intergalactic space, what is...

Ceaseless Reinvention Leads To Overlapping Solutions   David M. Eagleman, a Neuroscientist, Baylor College of Medicine; Author, Incognito: The Secret Lives of the… For centuries, neuroscience attempted to neatly assign labels to the various parts of the brain: this is the area for...

We don’t just respond to things as we see, feel, or hear them. Even our most seemingly simple pleasures are affected by our beliefs about hidden essences and the origins of a person or object   Why are we so concerned with the origins of objects? Why do we respond so much to our...

Researchers probe the neuroscience of creativity, seeing fMRI evidence that our notion of the “divided brain” is indeed mistaken   Painters, designers, architects and other creative individuals are typically thought of as “right-brained.” But a new study from the University of...

Placebo treatments can be effective in treating some conditions by the “self-healing” capabilities of the brain   There’s good evidence showing expectations to get better have significant effects on how patients suffering a variety of ailments feel. This is called the placebo effect...

In his new book, Vijay Vaitheeswaran argues that we’re thinking about worldchanging innovation all wrong: It’s not going to come from where we expect it. Bottom-Up Solutions To Top-Down Problems => Deductive Reasoning to Solve How We Perceive the World   The world is currently...

A familiar scent triggers childhood memories for our brain columnist, prompting him to wonder what is going on in his head   The toy cupboard at my grandmother’s house had a particular smell. I cannot tell you what it was, but sometimes now, as an adult, I will catch a whiff of it....

In one experiment, just telling a man he would be observed by a female was enough to hurt his psychological performance   Movies and television shows are full of scenes where a man tries unsuccessfully to interact with a pretty woman. In many cases, the potential suitor ends up acting...

The human mind has been long concerned about the existence of other parallel worlds. While many people still consider it nothing more than a weird scientific fantasy, a certain number of scientists nowadays not only are ready to take this hypothesis seriously but also find evidence in favour...

Margaret Moore is the founder and co-director of the Institute of Coaching at McLean Hospital. Paul Hammerness, MD, is a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Together, they hope to get at the physical and psychological roots of chaos. In a recent interview, Moore told Big Think...

“Do you think we should get our brains scanned before getting married?”   It’s not an outrageous question.  It’s the kind of questions that will help us to learn more about how our minds act in the world, while still keeping the world in mind. Technology and science have now...

Jonah Lehrer, in his book Proust Was a Neuroscientist, tells the story of how a handful of iconic creators each discovered an essential truth about the mind long before modern science was able to label and pinpoint it, makes a case for the extraordinary importance of the cross-pollination of...

New research reveals more clues as to why our ginger brethren seem, well, just a little bit different. Specifically, redheads appear to feel pain differently. While redheads are more sensitive to the cold, they appear to have a higher pain threshold than the rest of us. A recent study showed...

On the emotional scaffolding of the self, or how the dynamics of temperament fluctuate with social context   What does it mean to be human? Centuries worth of scientific thought, artistic tradition and spiritual practice have attempted to answer this most fundamental question about our...

The brain mechanisms of consciousness are being unravelled at a startling pace, with researchers focusing on eight key areas   Consciousness is at once the most familiar and the most mysterious feature of our existence. A new science of consciousness is now revealing its biological...

It has been often said that it is only by gaining a true understanding of the past that we can ever hope to find the vital key to understanding its future and in turn, our own. The reality is that our distant history is still an enormous riddle. We only know what we do from the gradual piecing...

Upper class people are more likely to behave selfishly, studies suggest Higher social classes more likely to lie, cheat, cut up other road users and not stop at pedestrian crossings, say researchers. A raft of studies into unethical behaviour across the social classes has delivered a withering...