Braincast 016 - Altruism

A peaceful topic at last: altruism, fairness, kindness. From scratch healthy brains are not capable of anything else – and they don´t want to, too. An episode of bright prospects.

MP3 File  Duration: 18:34

Enjoy Jaak Panksepp tickling his laughing rats.

NEWS

• You've Got to Be Flexible to Live in Complex Societies
  
• Sweet smells lead to sweet dreams
  
• The Army's Totally Serious Mind-Control Project
  
• Wasps Make Peace With Past Enemies
  
• How ambitious mothers breed successful daughters
  
• This is the brain on age
  
• Chimps never forget a bum
  
• Baby's Little Smiles: Building a Relationship with Mom
  
• Window of opportunity for stroke treatment widens
  
• Antidepressants may harm male fertility
  
• Metaphors of the Mind: Why Loneliness Feels Cold and Sins Feel Dirty
  
• Human memory capacity is mahusive!
  

SHOWNOTES
Nice music for a nice topic: we start with Josh James and Piano, continue with Eletrix and Road to Rio and Christophe Goze and Hi Honey. The finish is an encore for Paul Borth and Paul in love.

Braincast 015 - Basics - Imaging Techniques

How do we know what we know about the brain? And why did it become so much so fast? Braincast 15 wraps this dry topic to digest easily.

MP3 File Duration: 19:20

This weeks link is a special one – an article on wired.com: Software spots the spin in political speeches.

NEWS

• Watching practice change the brain cortex
  
• The secret benefits of fandom
  
• Age-related changes in midbrain dopaminergic regulation of the human reward system
  
• Erotic self-stimulation and brain implants
  
• The Blue Brain shows gamma oscillations
  
• Eyes: A New Window on Mental Disorders
  
• A simple toy, and what it says about how we learn to mentally rotate objects
  
• Could an Inner Zombie Be Controlling Your Brain?
  
• Judging others by our own capabilities
  
• A quick guide to Free Will
  
• Online gamers are fit – physically if not mentally
  
• Exposing some holes in Libet's classic free will study
  
• Beauty and the Brain
  
• The Politics of Fear
  
• Isolation That Chills to the Bone

SHOWNOTES
Imaging techniques work best with electronic music, so I thought. Therefor we start with Alienation and Beggars And Kings - the Chillout mix, exaggerate with Ariaphonics and the Divine Light and end with a great Ben Parsons and Shawl.

Braincast 014 - Memory

No function of the brain gets criticised more often. But the reasons are mostly wrong, nobody really wants absolute memory, as Braincast 14 shows. That memory is a quite creative affair – that would be a neat critique.

MP3 File Duration: 18:57

Very speciall: Jill Bolte Taylor in TED-Talk about her own stroke.

NEWS

• Computers cause abnormal brain growth - proof!
  
• The Teen Brain
  
• Mirrors suppress people's prejudice
  
• Taking One for the Team
  
• New brain cells are essential for learning
  
• Daydream achiever
  
• Monogamy gene found in people
  
• Finding a Guy Who Looks Like Dear Old Dad
  
• Thinking about Not-Thinking: Neural Correlates of Conceptual Processing during Zen Meditation
  
• We remember more from our teens and early twenties than from any other time of life
  
• Humans Can Learn from Subliminal Cues Alone
  
• Chauvinists less unnerving than ambiguous men
  
• New brain study finds more synapses in men than in women
  
• The Way S/he Moves
  
• Want to make a complicated decision? Keep thinking
  
• Phantom Limb Cure: Retraining the Brain
  
• Watching the testosterone crash in anxious men who lose a contest
  
• Fruit Flies Feel Peer Pressure
  
• Lottery Tickets and Credit Cards: The Dangers of an Irrational Brain
  

SHOWNOTES
Pianos in Braincast 14: The absolutly wonderful Piano Moods of Project M and Ash Verjee with Impromtu for Six Pianos.