This week it’s simple – top picks, the brain, and anthropology.

Top of the List

Mo Constandi, Brain’s Response to Fear Is Culture-Specific
Neurophilosophy covers research by Joan Chiao on the differing fear reactions of Americans and Japanese—facial expressions and amygdala reactions unite! Or rather, you fear what you know…

Women in Science, Open Laboratory 2008 Submissions
The best of 2008 science blogging either written by women or relevant to women.

Sean Malin, Itsy Bitsy Auctions
You too can bid on bats! Well, bat names. And check out more from this ND student’s blog, Open Economics. I did, and found this post on David Harvey, an author whose work I admire, as well as entire lecture by Harvey on The Enigma of Capital

Neuronarrative & Ars Psychiatrica
My two new favorite blogs. Just recently Neuronarrative has an interview with Jonah Lehrer on art, neuroscience and decision making; the post Brains Run Better Unleaded on lead poisoning and IQ loss, and the joy of doubt with the writer Jennifer Michael Hecht

At Ars Psychiatrica we find On Psychiatric Overdiagnosis, on psychiatry’s losing its way through its “war on mental illness” approach; an eclectic year in music; Joni Mitchell, Wallace Stevens, and theories of the early earth; and Lugubrious Lucubrations on intriguing parallels between psychiatrists and pain specialists.

Brain

Sean Mackey, The Science of Pain
Podcast over at Scientific American from the Stanford expert

Continue reading “Wednesday Round Up #41”

This week we have world affairs, anthropology, mental health, and the brain. Thanks to Paul for some very worthy additions.

Top of the List

A Blog around the Clock, The Open Laboratory 2008 – All the Submissions Fit to Print
The list of nominees for the best science blogging of 2008. Enjoy!

Neil Scheurich, Time Out of Joint
“I’ve always been interested in the way psychology has struggled to deal with the hulking fact of human depravity.”

Open Anthropology, UAE’s The National on the Human Terrain System (2.0)
Maximilian gives us a well-written critical reflection on the Human Terrain System – as the last entry for the foreseeable future, this is a great one to read

Kylie Sturgess, Is This A Superstition I See Before Me?
The theater and superstition. Worth it for the funny Black Adder clip alone.

Norman Doidge, Re-evaluating the Basis of the Brain
Plasticity rather than localization from the author of The Brain That Changes Itself

World Affairs

IBNLive, Blogging from India
Indian bloggers address the terror in Mumbai

CNN, The World’s Most Heinous Crime
The 60th anniversary of the UN Genocide Convention, a timeline of genocides since then, and questions about how and if genocide will stop

Anthropology

Hannah Fearn, The Great Divide
Social vs. evolutionary anthropology! Biology vs. culture makes a good story, even though there is some “reaching out” moments in the second half of the piece. For some critical reaction, see Michael Stewart’s post

Continue reading “Wednesday Round Up #40”

This week we have online wonders, mental health, anthropology, and the brain, along with the top picks.

Top of the List

Scicurious, Holiday Getting You Down? Pass the Turkey
Just in time for Thanksgiving: The low-down on tryptophan in the latest research from Neuropsychopharmacology

The Onion, New Pain-Inducing Advil Created For People Who Just Want To Feel Something, Anything
Ah, searing, life-affirming agony in a pill

Lisa Belkin, Time for (Parent) Sex
A range of the latest on parenting and sex, including Tyra Banks, adolescents, and parents with newborns

NeuroNarrative, The Psychology of Grifting
Trust, oxytocin, and professional con artists. Includes a great video, where a guy is conned into giving away his wallet! Watching it, you can see relationships, context, and language too… So trust is not just chemical.

Online Wonders (Or Not)

John Markoff, Microsoft Examines Causes of ‘Cyberchondria’
New study on self-diagnosis through the Internet – worst-case scenarios confirmed…

Virginia Heffernan, In This Week’s Magazine: Internet Man of Mystery
Profile of Virgil Griffith, founder of WikiScanner

Continue reading “Wednesday Round Up #39”

This week we have some favs, then anthropology, the brain, diet and a dash of philosophy. Enjoy.

Top of the List

Anthropology Now!
The new popular magazine brings cultural anthropology to the world! Features this provocative article, Are Women Evolutionary Sex Objects?

Bioephemera, And Another One Sucks Our Blood…
Vampire moths. And you thought it was safe to sleep at night.

Edge, The Problem of Consciousness: A Talk with Alva Noe
Video with the noted philosopher. “Life is the way the animal is in the world.”

Sasha Aslanian/Weekend America, Kids and Stress
Chronic adversity and stress responsivity – the latest from some good research

Anthropology

Third Tone Devil, Pictures from a Cellphone
Budapest, the beautiful brutal city, as explored by an anthropologist and his snapshots

Stephanie Lloyd, Field Notes from Paris: Social Pathology and the Globalization of Sentiments
Why such social anxiety now in France? The world-wide expansion of psychiatric models of self and pathology

Continue reading “Wednesday Round Up #38”

This week it’s sex, brains, anthro, and HIV/AIDS…

Top of the List

Jonah Lehrer, Poverty and the Brain
The Frontal Cortex on why inequality is bad for kids’ developing brains. Jonah discusses the new book Whatever It Takes by Paul Tough on the impact of poverty on children and the work of Geoffrey Canada to change things in Harlem. NPR also had a recent radio show on Canada and his Harlem Children’s Zone.
Jonah mentions the work of Martha Farah, and over at The Mouse Trap Sandy G provides a detailed consideration of Farah’s work in Neurological Correlates of Poverty. For even more on this topic, you can see the piece I wrote back in February entitled Poverty Poisons the Brain.

Olivier Morin, Community and Religion: Poor Predictors of the Bliss of Nations
The new Culture and Cognition blog keeps turning out some great stuff, this time on the Sunday fistfight in Jerusalem (complete with YouTube clip) and why latter-day Durkheimians like Jonathan Haidt aren’t all that.

Ty Burr, George Lucas Interview
The creator of Star Wars wants neuroanthropology!

Mohed Costandi, The Power of the Memory Molecule
Mo from Neurophilosophy writes this great piece in Scientific American’s Mind Matters

Sexuality

Nicole Yorio, Dating 101: The Truth About Why Men Cheat
Actual interviews and a compare-and-contrast sample – that gets us well beyond the usual tried-and-trite for this topic, even if ends up as a rather lite book

LL Wynn, What Is a Prostitute?
The anthropologist recounts her work in Egypt and the blurry lines of what counts as prostitution

Mind Hacks, The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
Things that go bonk in the night…. A great new book

Continue reading “Wednesday Round Up #37”