Ever driven while asleep? No? Are you sure? In America people fall asleep at the wheel all the time. Many sleep experiences are microsleeps, brief “lapses of attention” where much of your brain is asleep – but not necessarily all of it. Microsleeps are generally just seconds long. On the highway, a three second highway microsleep means […]
Do clothes make the brain? (4/18/12)
Seeing Behind Clothes Do the clothes you wear change how your brain processes information? Yes. But can the same suit of clothes, given a different occupational meaning, change the whole process of focus and how you see the world? Yes again. Clothes Make the Man Mark Twain’s statement that “clothes make the man” distills what […]
Your New Year’s Revolutions (12/29/10)
Take Charge It’s a New Year, so it’s time to take charge. Americans are often unhappy with their lives and even more unhappy about their futures. Start with not a resolution but a revolution – a new way of looking at your body and brain that let’s you more fully control your fate. You’re not […]
Fixing your internet addled brain (12/17/10)
Keeping the Mind Sharp Are you going to quit using the Internet? Come on! So what if unrestricted Net action will physically change your brain and body, dimming your analytic ability (see Nicholas Carr’s “The Shallows”), negate the long-term memory stores you’ll need to succeed in life (see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matthew-edlund-md/add-symptoms_b_656590.html#s119840,) and potentially make you fat, thick, […]
Can sleepwalking kill me, or is inattention more lethal? (12/13/10)
A Killing in Scarborough In 1987 Kenneth Parks, a 23 year old embezzler and gambler who had recently lost his job, drove 14 miles to the home of his mother and father-in-law in Scarborough, Ontario. Taking out a tire iron he beat them both before stabbing them with kitchen knives, killing his mother-in-law and leaving […]