Quick links from the past week or so in mind and brain news:
A fascinating personal account of ‘supposed demoniacal possession‘ from an 1849 edition of the Journal of Psychological Medicine.
‘Key to All Optical Illusions Discovered’ says over-enthusiastic headline for very interesting article.
An article in Seed Magazine discusses quantum physics and whether we create the world just by looking at it.
Dr Petra looks at new research showing that tackling depression may reduce risky sexual activity.
Six ground-breaking discoveries about the brain are covered by Neurophilosophy.
PsychCentral has a wonderful bit of detective work showing the Scientific American just replaced ‘writing’ with ‘blogging’ to re-release an article entitled ‘Blogging: It‚Äôs Good for You’.
Harvard psychiatrists and child bipolar researchers are caught out not declaring millions in drug company payouts, reports Furious Seasons.
BBC News reports that light therapy ‘can slow dementia’ and that a new ‘dual action’ Alzheimer’s drug may be on the horizon.
Which Cognitive Enhancers Really Work: Brain Training, Drugs, Vitamins, Meditation or Exercise? PsyBlog is on the case and Sharp Brains follows up with a considered analysis and commentary.
American Scientist tackles the ‘Britney Spears Problem’, which actually turns out to be about search algorithms.
Archaeologists discover a <a href="http://sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/32999/title/Acrobats_last_tumble
“>sacrificed acrobat in ancient Mesopotamian ruins, according to Science News.
Neurophilosophy looks at some proposed DARPA developed neurobinoculars.
A new study on the neuroscience of fairness is covered in a piece from the BPS Research Digest.
Eric Schwitzgebel considers the ability of the mind to self-perceive, with an interesting discussion continuing in the comments.
I love watching point-light motion video and Cognitive Daily has a fascinating research on how viewing motion give us such a clear way of identifying living things.
My Mind on Books previews a list of forthcoming cognitive science books for 2008.
Solomon Asch’s famous conformity experiment is recreated in a video hosted by The Situationist. Still just as powerful.
Philosophy Bites has an audio discussion on human agency – i.e. how we can understand when someone is doing something on purpose.
Mind Hacks 