Take Breaks During The Day

"There are many ways our brains can work smarter, not harder, but it’s always good to start by realizing when it’s time to take a break. Science tells us to unplug every 90 to 120 minutes."

‘Work Smarter, Not Harder’ Is Backed By Science

Atheism Is Not A Choice

"Atheism is not the act of turning one's back on any particular god. It isn't about being angry at anyone's preferred god. It isn't a choice at all. Most of us arrive at atheism, sometimes quite reluctantly, because we realize that there is not sufficient evidence to support belief in gods. In some ways, it is not terribly different from realizing that there is no Santa Claus. And once someone has realized that there is no Santa Claus, it is difficult to imagine how one might go about choosing to believe in Santa once again."

The Implications of Recognizing That Atheism is Not a Choice

The Problem With Eyewitness Testimony

"All of this is why when people say, 'I know what I saw,' my answer is, 'No you don’t. You have a constructed memory of a constructed perception all biased by your expectations and beliefs.'”

Making the Non-Existent Disappear
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Markers For Genetically-Linked Alzheimer's Disease Found In The Young

"Research on Alzheimer’s has largely focused on the characteristic proteins that build up in the brain in old age, but experimental drugs meant to target those symptoms have been disappointing. One relatively new theory is that the mind-robbing disease is actually a developmental disorder that begins much earlier in life."

Alzheimer’s Effects on the Brain Found in Young People

Why Belief In A God Is So Pervasive

"The researchers found that one region of the brain (the right inferior frontal gyrus) 'was activated more strongly in skeptics than in supernatural believers.' The more active that part of the brain, the less likely participants were to find supernatural meaning in the images. The researchers think this is because the active region of the brain is associated with cognitive inhibition."

Why doesn’t everyone believe in God?: The skeptical brain may hold the answer
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Understanding Consciousness Continues But In Small, Controversial Steps

"Michael Graziano, a neuroscientist at Princeton University, suggested to the audience that consciousness is a kind of con game the brain plays with itself. The brain is a computer that evolved to simulate the outside world. Among its internal models is a simulation of itself — a crude approximation of its own neurological processes."

Consciousness: The Mind Messing With the Mind

"The interaction of intense social interaction with evolving language was like rocket fuel to human consciousness. Out of this mix evolved culture."

Why are we conscious?

"The Attention Schema Theory (AST), developed over the past five years, may be able to answer those questions. The theory suggests that consciousness arises as a solution to one of the most fundamental problems facing any nervous system: Too much information constantly flows in to be fully processed. The brain evolved increasingly sophisticated mechanisms for deeply processing a few select signals at the expense of others, and in the AST, consciousness is the ultimate result of that evolutionary sequence. If the theory is right—and that has yet to be determined—then consciousness evolved gradually over the past half billion years and is present in a range of vertebrate species."

How Did Consciousness Evolve?

"His mistake is to go further, and conclude that physical goings-on can’t possibly be conscious goings-on. Many make the same mistake today — the Very Large Mistake (as Winnie-the-Pooh might put it) of thinking that we know enough about the nature of physical stuff to know that conscious experience can’t be physical. We don’t. We don’t know the intrinsic nature of physical stuff, except — Russell again — insofar as we know it simply through having a conscious experience."

Consciousness Isn't A Mystery. It's Matter.

"Tegmark’s approach is to think of consciousness as a state of matter, like a solid, a liquid or a gas. “I conjecture that consciousness can be understood as yet another state of matter. Just as there are many types of liquids, there are many types of consciousness,” he says."

Why Physicists Are Saying Consciousness Is Another State Of Matter

Consciousness Can Be Quantified

Stopping Mass Shooters

"So while at the moment relatively little is known about the early warning signs in a potential mass shooter, it may well be possible to detect mass shooters in advance if we change our approach in researching the area."

Predicting Who Will Become Mass Shooters

Remember When Humans Thought Only We Used Tools?

Do Insects Have Consciousness?

A Sensible Approach To Handling Terrorists

"My scheme, then is this: first try the accused to see if he/she did the crime. If the person is convicted, then tailor the punishment to the criminal and the crime, taking into account deterrence, sequestration, and reformation—but not retribution. The punishment, or treatment, should be determined by experts rather than judges or juries, though the experts don’t have to settle on a formal diagnosis. Norway conforms to this approach much more closely than the U.S., which may be why Norway’s prison recidivism rate is just 20% over five years, compared to 77% percent in the U.S."

Mass murderers: mental illness or extreme ideology?

Promising Method To Reduce Concussions During Athletics

"Woodpeckers spend their lives relentlessly beating their heads against trees, with each blow causing a jolt up to 1200g. Medically speaking, they should all be dead from concussion. So why aren't they?

Fit Body Leads To A Sharp Mind?

A Protein That Moves From Muscle To Brain May Tie Exercise To Memory

Improbability

"We can unconsciously increase the odds of a “rare” event occurring by post hoc analysis, open ended criteria (wiggle room), and mining large sets of data. In fact, we are inherently good at doing all of these things. We might call the overall process pattern recognition. Our brains evolved to make connections, to see patterns, and then to imbue them with meaning."

The Improbability Principle

Time To Enlighten Celebrities And Consumers

"According to Dr. Bragg, music celebrities could endorse healthier options, such as lower calorie beverages, 'because that would harness the celebrity’s’ popularity to promote healthy messages to young people. We know from research that adolescents care a lot about brand and really idolize celebrities, so this sort of popularity could be used to encourage healthy dietary habits.'"

Famous Singers Make Your Kids Fat

The Lost City

"It is important to understand our 'intelligent design bias', not to dismiss such hypotheses out of hand, but to remain cautious and maintain a healthy skepticism."

It’s important to remember that in order to conclude that an anomaly is the product of deliberate artifice, we need further evidence.

The Religious Apologist Says, "But You Can't Explain Consciousness."

Hold on.  In the last few years, some scientists studying consciousness have been working on a promising hypothesis called Attention Schema Theory (AST).  (Note: I wish scientists would stop using "theory" inappropriately:  how can we expect the public-at-large to understand science doing such?)

The AST covers a lot of ground, from simple nervous systems to simulations of self and others.

Sensory-Deprivation Tanks

"If psychological training is the next big thing for elite athletes, floating is right on the cutting edge—even if it isn’t exactly new. Neuropsychologist John C. Lilly began ­experimenting with sensory-deprivation tanks in the 1950s, and in the decades following, a wide body of research examined ­whether floating could be used to treat a ­variety of psychological disorders."

Steph Curry's Secret to Mental Strength?

Science Trumps Emotion In Solving Problems

"Imagine how different our world would be if reason and truth always won, if we were more like Houdini or Sherlock Holmes than like Arthur Conan Doyle. In reality, however, we are all guilty of 'motivated reasoning' – holding demonstrably false beliefs in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Instead of being genuinely open-minded, we search for data to support our beliefs."

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article81647112.html#storylink=cpy

Imagine if we stopped being ruled so much by our emotions when discussing sensitive topics

Another Reason To Accept Science Over Our Perceptions

Whatever you think, you don’t necessarily know your own mind.

The Soul

"The 'mind' is a useful idea, but this close connection between the brain and mental function leaves no room for a physical mind—something separate from the brain—to hide.

Four Neuromyths Debunked

Learning styles, You only use 10% of your brain, Right brain v left brain, Playing brain games makes you smarter