Scientific American

Age Brings Happiness

Sat, 25 May 2013 08:00:00 EST

Do people get happier or crankier as they age? Stereotypes of crotchety neighbors aside, scientists have been trying to answer this question for decades, and the results have been conflicting. Now a study of several thousand Americans born between 1885 and 1980 reveals that well-being indeed increases with age--but overall happiness depends on when a person was born.

[More]

NeuroSCIence in FIction: Kill Decision

Fri, 24 May 2013 23:34:00 EST

From the Sleights of Mind archives. [More]

#SciAmBlogs Friday - Kirk vs. Spock, bridge failure, elephant seals, chemical intuition, predatory journals, sleep learning, and more.

Fri, 24 May 2013 22:47:00 EST

- Jag Bhalla - The Cognitive Science of Star Trek [More]

Anti-Psychiatry Prejudice? A response to Dr. Lieberman

Fri, 24 May 2013 15:21:00 EST

[caption id="attachment_4683" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="Facets of the field"] [/caption] [More]

Recommended: High Price

Fri, 24 May 2013 13:00:00 EST

High Price: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know about Drugs and Society [More]

The Cognitive Science of Star Trek

Fri, 24 May 2013 11:12:00 EST

Star Trek needs more advanced cognitive science. The work of Kahneman can augment one of its central philosophical themes. We now have less warped models of intuition, logic, and morality.Take one small but telling example from the latest Star Trek movie: Kirk, in a dire spot, says he wants to be more like Spock: He'd like to choose not to feel. This reiterates an old rationalist desire. Rationalist philosophy, says David Brooks, believes " reason is more powerful than and separable from emotion " and hopes that " reason...triumphs over emotion ." This widely used dichotomy mis-frames what cognitive science shows. [More]

Girls Who Are Sexually Abused More Likely to Start Using Substances before Age 10

Fri, 24 May 2013 10:10:00 EST

Many studies have confirmed the link between childhood sexual abuse and substance-related problems in adulthood. But a new investigation finds that being raped or molested at a young age also makes young girls far more likely to start drinking or doing drugs during their preteen years.

[More]

Khalil's Picks (24 May 2013)

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:43:00 EST

The Oklahoma tornado disaster was chilling in terms of sheer power and devastation caused. In this week's picks, I highlight two articles about tornadoes. The first one, by Douglas Main , examines the underlying causes of such destructive tornadoes and the second one, by Adam Kucharski , looks at the challenge in forecasting seemingly unpredictable tornadoes.

On a more joyous note, this week's picks comprises numerous blog posts from Scitable blogs, which just relaunched this week [full disclosure: I am the Community Manager of Scitable blogs]. The blog posts span a variety of topics including physics, cosmology, evolution, psychology, geology, oceanography among others. Scitable bloggers highlighted this week are: Thomas Nguyen , James Keen , Sedeer el-Showk , Jon Tennant , Jane Robb , Sara Mynott , Bruce Braun , Dana Smith and Kate Whittington .

[More]

What is chemical intuition?

Fri, 24 May 2013 09:06:00 EST

[caption id="attachment_1481" align="alignleft" width="295" caption="The color of chemical compounds can often serve as an intuitive device for predicting their properties (Image: MarineBio)"] [/caption]Recently I read a comment by a leading chemist in which he said that in chemistry, intuition is much more important than in physics . This is a curious comment since intuition is one of those things which is hard to define but which most people who play the game appreciate when they see it. It is undoubtedly important in any scientific discipline and certainly so in physics; Einstein for instance was regarded as the outstanding intuitionist of his age, a man whose grasp of physical reality unaided by mathematical analysis was unmatched. Yet it seems to me that "chemical intuition" is a phrase which you hear much more than "physical intuition". When it comes to intuition, chemists seem to be more in the league of financial traders, geopolitical experts and psychologists than physicists. [More]

To sleep perchance to learn

Thu, 23 May 2013 22:47:00 EST

From the Sleights of Mind archives. When I was 11 or 12, my geography teacher in Spain announced that every student needed to learn the capital of each country in the world, in addition to all the major geographical features of every continent: rivers, mountain ranges, capes, gulfs, and archipelagos. [More]

#SciAmBlogs Thursday - science diagrams, mental illness art, beavers are fish, amphibian decline, cicadas, and more.

Thu, 23 May 2013 22:04:00 EST

Check out the new Video of the Week . [More]

Hip Hop Evolutionary Tales

Thu, 23 May 2013 20:07:00 EST

Video of the Week #93, May 23th, 2013: [More]

Studies Cast Doubt on Cancer Drug as Alzheimer's Treatment

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:25:00 EST

From Nature magazine

[More]

An Itch Is Not a Low-Level Form of Pain

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:05:00 EST

From Nature magazine

[More]

The Art and Science of the Diagram: Communicating the Knowledge of the Heavens, the Earth and the Arcane, Final Part

Thu, 23 May 2013 08:23:00 EST

[More]

A Brief History of Mental Illness in Art

Thu, 23 May 2013 08:00:00 EST

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="466" caption="Saint Bartholomew Exorcising, circa 1440-1470 (Google Art Project, via Wikimedia Commons)"] [/caption]"Historically, many cases of demonic possession have masked major psychiatric disorder[s]."- Kazuhiro Tajima-Pozo et. al . BMJ Case Reports 2009 [More]

Brain's Glial Cells Spark Seizures

Thu, 23 May 2013 08:00:00 EST

When neurons fire together uncontrollably, epileptic seizures ensue. Yet what sparks the cells to go haywire in the first place? In January scientists found an unexpected answer. When glial cells in the cortex of fruit flies cannot properly control their calcium levels, they leave neighboring neurons vulnerable to seizures.

[More]

Illusion of the week: It Kind Of Looks Like a Building

Wed, 22 May 2013 23:59:00 EST

The New York Daily News sums up this story better than I can: Apparently, after thinking long and hard, the mouthpiece for China's Communist Party was cocksure that the erection of a new headquarters would be warmly received -- but they blew it. [More]

#SciAmBlogs Wednesday - niche construction, cicadas, ageing, Moon, pirates' dodo, sick caecilians, hurricane forecasts, and more.

Wed, 22 May 2013 22:33:00 EST

- David Rothenberg - Discover the Secret of the 17-Year Cicada, But It Won't Get You Tenure [More]

Discover the Secret of the 17-Year Cicada, But It Won t Get You Tenure

Wed, 22 May 2013 15:40:00 EST

All the hoopla over the 17-year cicadas, set to emerge any day now in the Northeast, has so far missed one of the greatest facts about them. Sure, it's no surprise for grand gatherings of male animals to get together and sing their hearts out. Frogs do it, crickets do it, and we all know that humans do it. In animals it's called a lek, in humans it's called a rock band, and these words basically mean the same thing.That's what we thought 17-year cicadas were up to--they emerge only in these rare prime-numbered years after slowly growing underground to live just a few weeks high in the trees to sing, fly, mate and die. The females are just attracted to all this noise and mating then happens. [More]