Lives on Earth

brain

  • The Brain Speaks Out

    Good Morning. I’m pleased to see so many members here today. I’ll be speaking about the basic functions of my department, Head Quarters. It’s my belief that many current descriptions of the so-called “mind”—expressions such a “self-aware,” “highly intelligent,” “imaginative”—point to… Continue reading

  • The Body Electric

    We are juiced. From head to toe, electric signals pour into the brain from eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and skin as the raw data for what we see on a screen, hear across the room, feel at our fingertips. In… Continue reading

  • Winning-Streak, Everyone-Agrees-With-Me, You-Cut-Me-Off, and Other Biases of the Brain

    If you’re feeling cynical about the human race, a site to stay away from is Wikipedia’s List of Cognitive Biases. It describes more than 150 ways in which our thought processes systematically deviate from objective observation and rational thinking. It’s a… Continue reading

  • “The Mind Is Mainly Drawn to the Future”

    “The mind is mainly drawn to the future.” So write Martin Seligman and John Tierney in “We Aren’t Built to Live in the Moment” in the New York Times on May 21, 2017. The article is based on the book… Continue reading

  • How Consciousness Might Have Evolved

    Human consciousness. Our mad, prodigious mind. Our personhood. Where did consciousness come from? How did it become part of us? How did it become us? Michael Graziano, a neuropsychologist I’ve posted about before, writes in the June 2016 Atlantic about… Continue reading

  • Michael Graziano on How the Brain Creates Consciousness and Spirituality

    Psychologist Michael Graziano proposes that our consciousness is more mechanical and less mysterious than we think. But he argues as well that this theory does not diminish the validity of our spiritual experiences. Graziano, in Consciousness and the Social Brain,… Continue reading

  • People Are Different

    One perception of mine that has strengthened over the years is how different people are. When I was young, I thought of these differences mostly because of the difficulties they presented—how to talk to this girl, how to respond to… Continue reading