Neurontic

Neurontic's New Home

2006-12-11T12:43:00.000-05:00

I'm thrilled to announce that Neurontic is now part of Seed Magazine's Science Blogs.

The new site is live, so please go check it out when you have some time: http://scienceblogs.com/neurontic/.

Eventually this link will redirect. But -- as many of you already know -- computers are not my forte. Your patience during the move is much appreciated.

Sunday's Non-Silly Science Roundup

2006-12-10T11:48:00.000-05:00

My apologies for the delay in getting to the next Big Question. Be assured, I haven't forgotten--I've just been buried in final papers. In lieu of a real entry, I'm providing a roundup of "non-silly" science writing worth checking out:

First, Noam Chomsky -- Linguist-cum-Know-It-All -- has a brief essay on The Edge in which he declares that:

On the ordinary problems of human life, science tells us very little, and scientists as people are surely no guide. In fact they are often the worst guide, because they often tend to focus, laser-like, on their professional interests and know very little about the world.

You have to admire the man’s certitude. That said, I couldn’t disagree with him more. A brief perusal of Science Daily or New Scientist demonstrates that scientists have plenty to say about “ordinary problems.” The articles currently on display in Science Daily’s “Mind & Brain” section, for example, offer die-hard smokers advice on how to quit, warn hockey superfans that they may end up deaf, and caution those with inferiority complexes to steer clear of novel plot twists.

I can’t help wondering if Mr. Chomsky is making the mistake of equating all scientists with his hyper-theoretical MIT colleagues Steven Pinker and Marc Hauser. If so, I’d like to be the first to remind him that most scientists don’t occupy the nosebleed section of the Ivory Tower. Only a very select group has the luxury of trying to determine “how nature designed our universal sense of right and wrong,” or the time to rail against the “modern denial of human nature.” And I’d be willing to wager that they too see their work as an attempt to address issues that impact people’s daily lives.

In other news . . .

After an extended hiatus, Clive Thompson is back online at Collision Detection and has an interesting post on "why interactive websites can create false memories.”

Over at Gladwell.com, The New Yorker’s resident systemitizer is trying to outline the “hierarchy of hate speech” on the heels of Michael Richard’s outburst.

And speaking of Gladwell, those of you who enjoyed his take on mass hysteria in The Tipping Point may be interested to learn that there was a recent outbreak among English school children after a small number watched a video on “human biology.” Oddly, neither Mind Hacks nor the article it cites goes into any detail about what was in the video. Color me curious.

A Sour Note for Science Bloggers

2006-12-02T19:41:00.000-05:00

A Blog Around The Clock recently posted an entry titled, “You Gotta Be Nuts to Vote for Bush!” Normally I’m a huge fan of The Clock, but this post left me feeling a little sick to my stomach. It describes the vague outlines of a study conducted by Christopher Lohse, a master’s candidate in social work at the “highly prestigious” Southern Connecticut State University. Louse claims to have found a “direct link between mental illness and support for President Bush.” How? He surveyed . . .

69 psychiatric outpatients in three Connecticut locations during the 2004 presidential election. Lohse's study, backed by SCSU Psychology professor Jaak Rakfeldt and statistician Misty Ginacola, found a correlation between the severity of a person's psychosis and their preferences for president: The more psychotic the voter, the more likely they were to vote for Bush.

All of this, mind you, was relayed in an article in The New Haven Advocate, because the specifics of Lohse’s project aren’t actually available to the public yet.

As Orac over at Respectful Insolence wisely said: “When I encounter a study that seems to confirm my biases, as a skeptic, I try very hard to be even more skeptical than usual, because I would hate to be caught trumpeting a weak or bogus study as evidence supporting a belief of mine.” One would assume that most bloggers share his qualms, which makes it all the more surprising that The Clock and several other left-leaning blogs, were so quick to latch on to Lohse’s “findings,” sans data.

Shame on them. As information gurgles to the surface about Lohse’s study, his results are beginning to seem more and more spurious. According to The New Haven Advocate article, Lohse didn’t even set out to measure political preferences in these patients. In fact, Jaak Rakfeldt, Louse’s thesis advisor, told the reporter that the project “was not intended to show what it did,” admitted that data “were mined after the fact,” and that he hadn’t even bothered to look at “Lohse's conclusions regarding Bush.” (No wonder Southern Connecticut State University has such a stellar reputation.) Beyond these obvious red flags, as Deep Thought noted in the comments section of The Clock, “There is a rather large difference between 'A small sample of psychotics split 60/40 for a particular candidate' and 'Conservatives are crazy and dangerous.'”

Considering how much ink has been spilled in scientific circles over the Bush Adminstration’s willingness to skew science to further its political agenda, I find it appalling that normally levelheaded bloggers got swept away in this quasi-scientific brand of conservative bashing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no fan of Little Green Footballs. But politics and science make strange bedfellows, and one must always proceed with extreme caution when mixing the two.

Educated Guesses

2006-11-29T16:18:00.001-05:00

It's going to be a few days before the next "Big Question" post. In the meantime, I thought I'd let the scientific luminaries speak for themselves:

The New Scientist has asked top scientists from a variety of fields to "forecast the future." I was particularly struck by Oliver Sacks' and Antonio Damasio's predictions. And those who found the "Quantum Physics for Artists" entry intriguing will want to check out Nobel Prize winning Theoretical Physicist Gerard 't Hooft's submission. Hooft believes that physicists will construct "a theory that not only unites quantum mechanics and gravity, but also predicts every single detail of the evolution of the universe," within the next 50 years.

If that whets your appetite, you may want to spend some time browsing the "Dangerous Ideas" on display over at The Edge. They're a bit older, but no less fascinating.

Quantum Physics for Artists

2006-11-26T10:13:00.000-05:00

I need to preface this entry by saying two things. First, I’m no quantum physicist. This is intended to be an introduction for the lay reader. Readers who are well versed in particle physics will no doubt be alarmed by my reductionism. So be it. You have to start somewhere. I would encourage those of you interested in delving deeper to read Michio Kaku’s 2006 book Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos.

Second, nothing bugs me more than getting hooked on a blog about, say, macramé and finding that the author has suddenly become obsessed with third world politics. If I wanted to read about third world politics, I’d go to the BBC website, ya know. By writing about quantum physics, some readers will accuse me of committing a similar transgression. In my defense, I’ll say only this, quantum physics in increasingly grappling with questions that were once considered the province of psychologists and theologians—questions like: What is the nature of self? And is there a god? I would argue that this line of inquiry qualifies as “psychology for the modern mind.”

Okay, that was my apologia. Now for the good stuff.

An Overview

In The End of Mr. Y, British novelist Scarlett Thomas presents the most concise, commonsense explanation of quantum physics I’ve ever run across:

Quantum physics deals with subatomic particles, in other words, particles that are smaller than atoms . . . But when physicists first began theorizing about these particles and observing them in action in particle accelerators and so on, they found out that the subatomic world doesn’t act the way we’d expect.

All that common sense stuff—the past happening before the future, cause and effect, Newtonian physics, and Aristotelian poetics—none of it is applicable at the subatomic level. In a deterministic universe . . . you can always tell what’s going to happen next, if you have enough information about what went before. And you can always know things for sure. It’s always night or day, for example: It’s never both at once. On a quantum level, things don’t make sense in that way.

(The End of Mr. Y, 137-138)

This is a perfect jumping off point for our conversation. Try not to get discouraged by the phrases “Newtonian physics and Aristotelian poetics.” Newtonian physics, for the scientifically challenged, is just capital ‘P’ physics—the kind you encountered in high school. As for Aristotelian poetics, this is just a fancy way of describing conventional notions of time. In our world, time behaves predictably. Every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end. This doesn’t hold true in the world of subatomic particles.

The Wacky World of Subatomic Particles

Subatomic particles are a lawless bunch. They refuse to be hemmed in by traditional notions of time and space. You and I are constrained by the laws of the physical world. We can only be in one place and one time. Our ability to interact with other people is contingent on proximity. (If I want to hug my mother, she has to be in the same room. If she’s on another continent, I’m forced to settle for a phone call.) And for us, the physical world is concrete. I may understand that I’m made up of the same stuff as my table on a philosophical level, but that doesn’t make me Neo. I still have to walk around it rather than through it. These rules don’t apply to quarks.

As Thomas writes, these “particles can go through walls just like that. There are pairs of particles that seem to be connected and stay connected in some way even when they are separated by millions of miles.” And there’s no three-act structure for these guys. They can be in multiple places at the same time. For them, beginning, middle, and end have no meaning. They exist in a state of never ending possibility known as a wavefunction.

Doing Cruel Things to Cats in the Name of Physics

The classic example of the dual nature of subatomic particles is, of course, Schrodinger’s cat. In 1935, a physicist named Erwin Schrodinger devised a thought experiment that allowed people to wrap their heads around the idea of a wavefunction. He said, imagine you put a cat in a metal box. Then, imagine that before closing the lid, you inserted a small amount of some radioactive substance. Two possibilities exist: the atoms could decay, thus triggering the release of an acid, which would kill the cat; or the atoms could remain in tact and the cat would survive.

Schrodinger was trying to answer a question: “when does a quantum system stop existing as a mixture of states and become one or the other?” Put simply, when does the wavefunction give way to one reality? The answer: not until someone is there to observe the cat. The cat’s fate will only be decided if someone pops the lid and checks in on it. If the cat remains in the box undisturbed, both possibilities will persist. The cat will be simultaneously dead and alive.

Both the Observor and the Observed

I like to think of quantum particles as wayward teenagers. When they’re on their own, it’s total mayhem. They’re doing drugs; they’re having sex; they’re generally thumbing their nose at “the man.” But once you get them in a room with their grandmother, they’re totally different creatures. Well-groomed, polite, and eager to please. In this analogy, we are the grandmother. When we’re there to watch how quarks conduct themselves, the hijinks come to end. No more walking through walls, or existing in multiple places at once. They begin to behave the way we expect them to.

But here’s where it starts to get really complicated. Because you are made up of these rebellious particles, you’re not just the grandmother. You’re also the wayward teen. And so is everything else. The tree outside your bedroom window. The chicken you cooked for dinner last night. The computer you’re browsing on. The question then becomes, why are we so constrained? If our subatomic particles are capable of walking through tables and being at the opera and the gas station at the same time, why aren’t we?

The answer, simply put, is that there’s always a grandmother watching us, keeping our behavior in check. 'But that’s just not true,' you say. 'If I’m locked away in my studio apartment watching The Sopranos on my own, there’s no grandmother.’ And you’re right. But according to quantum theory, when you’re in a witness-free environment, you’re just like the cat. You exist in a state of pure possibility and that won’t change until the pizza delivery guy shows up at your door and forces your quarks to cleave to reality. Weird, no? Well, brace yourself, because it gets even weirder.

The Problem with The Big Bang

If you buy into the idea that a quantum system exists as a mixture of states until an observer comes along and forces its hand, it brings up some profound questions about the beginning of life. According to quantum physics, the Big Bang wouldn’t have been possible without an observer to tip the scales. The explosion that gave rise to life on earth would simply have been one possibility floating around in a sea of possibilities. This realization has prompted some of the more romantic physicists out there to say there was an observer: God. Others aren’t satisfied with this explanation, thus was born the many-worlds interpretation.

The many-worlds interpretation says that because there was no observer to bring about the Big Bang, we essentially exist in a giant wave function. The Big Bang did not “happen” in a deterministic sense. It’s just one of a gazillion possibilities existing side by side. And we, humans, happen to live inside that possibility.

What does this mean for you and me? It means that we don’t exist in a deterministic sense either. The consciousness I’m experiencing is just one expression of the possibility that is called Orli. In this particular expression, I’ve made it to the age of 32. I live in a comfortable 1-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. And I’m preparing to heat up a bowl of turkey soup. But on parallel planes, there are Orlis who decided to wait to eat; Orlis who opted to go to the gym instead of sitting down in front of the computer. There could also be Orlis who never made it out of childhood, and Orlis who opted to become hemp farmers in Santa Cruz instead of writers.

And, of course, it's not just about us piddling humans. The many-worlds interpretation also implies the existence of parallel worlds: Worlds where humans never bested the Neanderthals; where America was never colonized by Westerners; where the Holocaust never happened; and the atom bomb was never invented.

Contemplating the many-worlds interpretation always gives me a pleasant sense of vertigo. Being commitment-phobic by nature, I love the idea that all the possibilities this version of Orli has turned her back on still exist somewhere on an alternate plane. Others find the idea crazy-making. Not only does it require you to relinquish god, it also necessitates the abolishment of the soul. According to the many-worlds interpretation, you aren’t a unique flower destined to meet your maker in a giant park in the sky. You’re just one of an infinite number of possibilities.

A Manifesto

2006-11-19T15:50:00.000-05:00

I’m angry with my science teachers. I wish I could track them all down and give them a good tongue-lashing. They allowed me to get all the way through 12th grade believing that science was the domain of left-brainers: People who enjoyed computations and categorizations. People who seemed bent on bleeding life of all its color and distilling it down to a series of sterile “laws.” They never gave me any indication that learning the periodic table, the laws of physics, or the basics of evolution was just the grunt work—the equivalent of practicing scales so that you could go on to tackle Bach.

I was sold down the river. For years and years, I believed what CP Snow said about the two cultures. I believed you were offered admittance into one of two worlds: literature, philosophy, and the arts, or science. Once you received your passport, your ability to navigate between them was severely restricted. These two cultures had managed, with much finagling, to establish a kind of détente, like Russia and the US during the Cold War. And too much back and forth between them threatened this delicate equilibrium.

Of course, I opted to join the right-brainers. Given the choice between spending my time mucking around with charts and graphs and reading Fitzgerald, Whitman, and Blake, it seemed impossible to do otherwise. I was interested in the Big Picture questions, not the fine print. Science, it seemed to me, was all about the fine print. It’s only over the past year that I’ve begun to realize just how wrong I was.

I stumbled into writing about neuroscience entirely by accident. I was taking a class with Adam Penenberg, the technology writer, and one of the requirements was starting a blog. Write about something that fascinates you, he said. Given my low-grade ADD, I was having trouble choosing. But it occurred to me that there was a thread linking most of my obsessions: the quest to understand human nature. Then, I stumbled on an article in The New York Times by Sandra Blakeslee about mirror neurons, "Cells That Read Minds."

Having virtually no grounding in science, it took me a couple of reads to grasp the nature of mirror neurons, but I was immediately caught by Blakeslee description of their import:

The human brain has multiple mirror neuron systems that specialize in carrying out and understanding not just the actions of others but their intentions, the social meaning of their behavior and their emotions.

"We are exquisitely social creatures," Dr. Rizzolatti said [the man who "discovered" mirror neurons]. "Our survival depends on understanding the actions, intentions and emotions of others."

He continued, "Mirror neurons allow us to grasp the minds of others not through conceptual reasoning but through direct simulation. By feeling, not by thinking."

The discovery is shaking up numerous scientific disciplines, shifting the understanding of culture, empathy, philosophy, language, imitation, autism and psychotherapy.

(For more on mirror neurons to read: "Psychic Cells.")

I was floored. Cells that allowed us to feel with other people? Had they really discovered the biological underpinnings of empathy? This was the Rosetta Stone! Literature allows us to represent human experience, I thought; philosophy is an attempt to systematize it; and psychology enabled us to begin conceptualizing the nature of the self. But it suddenly it occurred to me that science could delineate what was really going on inside our heads. The idea that there were two cultures imploded in an instant. I was drunk on the potential, and Neurontic was born just a few days later.

Why am I telling you all this now? Because I’m not the only one who had lousy science teachers. Over the past 12 months, I’ve become convinced that many of you also bought into the myth of the two cultures. And I’m hell bent on changing that.

My world is peopled with right-brainers—creative types who stick the science section of The Times in the trash the moment they unwrap the paper. These are not incurious people; nor are they stupid people. They are people who still associate science with practicing scales. And even if a particular article strikes their fancy, they’ve spent so little time visiting “the world of science,” they fear the language will be entirely foreign to them. So they just don’t bother. And that’s a shame, because science is the new philosophy.

It is the possibility of one day being able to answer the Big Picture questions that fuels my growing obsession with science. And I fear I haven’t done a very good job articulating this to the reader. So, for the next couple of weeks we’re going to dangle our toes in the deep end.

I plan to write about two subjects: how scientific findings are challenging the traditional notion of “the self,” and the overlap between quantum physics and theology. Yes, I know, it sounds daunting. But I will do my utmost to keep things simple. If I’m successful, this won’t feel like homework; it will feel like intellectual playtime, because that’s how it feels to me.

Shameless Plug for Yours Truly

2006-11-17T13:55:00.000-05:00

Just a quick note to let those of you interested in my non-brain related writing know that I will be contributing regular book reviews to several community papers in Manhattan:

*The Downtown Express
*The Villager
*Chelsea Now

Here’s a link to my review of Erik Larson’s latest offering, Thunderstruck: The Illusionist.

Next up, Scarlett Thomas’s riveting novel: The End of Mr. Y. I won’t say much about the book in advance of the review. But if you’re the type of person who spent time in college grappling with the mysteries of consciousness, the circuitous theories of Derrida, or the lunacy of quantum physics, The End of Mr. Y will make you remember why.

Finding Happiness

2006-11-16T15:44:00.002-05:00

The dark days of winter are upon us, folks, and as you know, wintertime has been shown to make many of us SAD. Luckily, experts in a variety of disciplines have been working feverishly to come up with strategies to stave off the blues and enhance happiness. Below, you’ll find a sampling of some of theories currently in vogue.

*Not long ago, a multidisciplinary team of experts in the UK compiled a list of 10 behaviors they claim have been statistically proven to promote happiness:

1) Plant something and nurture it
2) Count your Blessings – at least five – at the end of everyday
3) Take time to talk – have an hour-long conversation with a loved one each week
4) Phone a friend you have not spoken to for a while and arrange a meet up
5) Give yourself a treat every day and take the time to really enjoy it
6) Have a good laugh at least once a day
7) Get physical – exercise for half and hour three times a week
8) Smile at and/or say hello to a stranger at least one each day
9) Cut your TV viewing by half
10) Spread some kindness – do a good turn for someone every day

(Path to true happiness ‘revealed.’)

Some of these seem like practical suggestions. I can’t think of anything snarky to say about talking to a loved one, treating myself to something special, exercising, or even cutting my TV intake. That said, several of the prescriptions sound specious at best. Oprah has been urging people to “count their blessings” for years with negligible results. And how exactly does one go about “spreading kindness” exactly? This strikes me as something that might get you in trouble in New York—as does “smiling and saying hello to a stranger.” Call me paranoid.

As for the plant thing, the happiness doctors have made a faulty assumption. Not all of us have green thumbs. I have tried to “nurture” many a potted plant only to have it breathe its last gasp in my arms. This left me decidedly sadder than when I began, thus prompting me to renounce plant growing altogether. Does this destine me for a life of melancholy? Not so far.

I’m not wowed by this prescription. Are you? Fine then. Let’s move on.

*Perhaps a more methodical approach will suit us better. A British life coach claims to have come up with the “happiness formula:” P + (5xE) + (3xH)= Happiness.

According to the BBC, Pete Cohen stumbled on this magic equation after interviewing 1000 people. Not a huge control group, but hey, he’s a life coach. He knows what he’s talking about, right?

Here’s how it works: ‘P’ represents “Personal Characteristics,” which include “outlook on life, adaptability, and resilience;" ‘E’ represents "Existence," the quality of which is apparently determined by your health, friendships, and financial solvency; ‘H’ stands for “Higher Order Needs,” like self esteem, ambition and humor.

If all of this is bringing back unpleasant memories of your high school algebra class, don’t dismay. Determining your happiness quotient is easier than it appears at first glance. All you need to do is rate yourself on the following questions, using a score of 1-10 (with 10 being “to a large extent,” and 1 being “not at all”):

1) Are you outgoing, energetic, flexible and open to change?

2) Do you have a positive outlook, bounce back quickly from setbacks and feel that you are in control of your life?

3) Are your basic life needs met, in relation to personal health, finance, safety, freedom of choice and sense of community?

4) Can you call on the support of people close to you, immerse yourself in what you are doing, meet your expectations and engage in activities that give you a sense of purpose?

To tabulate your results, add the scores from question 1 and 2. This gives you the value of ‘P.’ The value of ‘E’ is the score from question 3, and ‘H’ is the score from question 4. The closer you get to 100, the happier you are.

See, it’s easy. Except, wait: What happens if you don’t happen to be ‘outgoing?’ What if it takes you a while to recover from a setback? What if after several basket weaving workshops, a pottery class, and Ph.D. in linguistics, you find that a “sense of purpose’ still eludes you? Hmm. Problematic. I suppose you’d just have to work overtime, and get some more friends, thus pumping up your “Existence” score, and offsetting your tragically low personality score. If any of you try this, please let me know how it goes. (And don’t underestimate the power of “a positive outlook.”)

*For those of you unwilling to make new friends or reluctant to launch a full scale self-improvement campaign, might I suggest an alternative: move. Adrian White, an analytic social psychologist from the University of Leicester, has just completed the world’s first Happiness Map. White found that, despite what you were told as a child, Disneyland is not the happiest place on earth: Denmark is (at least compared to the 177 other countries on White’s roster).

So, there you go, all you need to do to be happy is relocate to Denmark. However, those of you who weren't fortunate enough to have been born Danish or to have married a Dane may find the Danish government resistant to this idea. Fear not! You have other options. After reviewing the map, I’ve come up with a list of geographical do’s and dont's designed to safeguard your happiness. For optimum happiness:

*DO choose a tiny country with a tiny population
*DO opt for the most homogenous state available to you
*DO look for a country with socialized medicine, an extremely high tax rate, and an elaborate welfare system

Appropriate options include:
- Switzerland (The 2nd happiest place on earth.)
- Austria (3rd)
- Iceland (4th)
- The Bahamas (5th. But let’s face it folks: the Bahamas are gonna get bum rushed. To avoid competition, choose a colder locale.)

*DON’T live in Africa
*DON’T be ruled by a despot, a potentate, or a tin-pot dictator
*DON’T not have socialized medicine. (I can’t stress this enough.)
*DON’T follow the crowds

Examples of the correlation between discontent and overpopulation: India (the 125th happiest place on earth), and China (82nd).

*ABOVE ALL avoid disease breeding grounds, and areas prone to famine and chronic underemployment (like Africa).

Not essential, but worth considering when honing in on a choice:
*Current and former world powers don’t rank particularly well when it comes to happiness.

Examples:
- US: 23rd happiest place on earth
- UK: 41st
- France: 62nd
- Russia: 167th

I wish you the best of luck on your travels.

The Quest for Long Life

2006-11-09T12:34:00.000-05:00

Over the past decade, as Baby Boomers have begun flooding the ranks of the AARP, science has become increasingly focused on discovering the recipe for longevity. Every week, it seems, a new study is published touting the life extending powers of antioxidants, exercise, or sleep.

By and large, the anti-aging prescriptions issued over the last 10 years have been sensible. It’s hard to take issue with the idea that eating more greens, getting more sleep, and breaking the occasional sweat promotes health. But as the eldest Boomers enter their sixties, the mania for longevity seems to be reaching a fever pitch, and the quest for long life is becoming more and more bizarre. Case in point, the hunger fad, better known as the Calorie Restriction Diet.

In the early 90s, a UCLA pathologist named Roy Walford volunteered to shut himself away with seven other bioscientists in a hermetically sealed terrarium in the Arizona desert for two years. Why? It’s unclear. (My suspicion: Too many science fiction novels.) The point here is that the group quickly discovered that the “self-sustaining” ecosystem they’d engineered to provide for their nutritional needs wasn’t quite up to par. They were on the verge of abandoning the experiment when Walford proposed a solution.

He happened to be tracking some research on the impact of calorie restriction and was intrigued by the discovery that limiting food intake improved health and extended the life spans of species as varied as dogs, worms, and spiders. Walford suggested they use their time in the biosphere to find out if the same could be said for humans. The group spent the next two years eating just enough to stave off starvation. When they emerged, “tests proved them healthier in nearly every nutritionally relevant respect than when they’d gone in.” (The Fast Supper)

Walford was so convinced by the results that he later published what would become the bible of the Calorie Restriction Movement, Beyond the 120-Year Diet: How to Double Your Vital Years. His recipe for long life is simple in theory and punishing in practice. All you need to do is make sure you eat between 20 and 40 percent fewer calories than the recommended amount.

According to dietary experts, a woman my size should eat around 2000 calories per day to maintain a healthy weight. If I was really intent on living longer, I’d have to reduce my daily calorie intake to 1200. That may look like a fair amount on paper, but consider this: A dinner consisting of a six-ounce steak, a Cesar salad, and two glasses of wine would net roughly 1100 calories. If I splurged and enjoyed a Café au Lait with skim milk (110 calories) for dessert, I’d blow my entire wad. Of course, strict adherents of the Walford doctrine would never dream of eating anything so decadent. Instead, they opt for a steady trickle of foods like Quorn, kale, and carrots. Yummy!

Now, let’s set aside for the moment the fact that calorie deprivation has not been scientifically proven to extend human life. Advocates of the Calorie Restriction regimen argue that the benefits of the diet have been amply demonstrated in animals. Let’s say that’s true. The question remains: Is a life of such extreme deprivation worth living? Sure, you might get five or ten extra years, but the trade off is you're required to live like a monk. No more drinks after work; no more dinner parties; no more birthday cake. Under these conditions, I’m guessing those extra years you’d earned would feel long indeed.

But, hey, maybe I’m just a glutton. Luckily, there’s a new scientific finding tailor-made for people like me, who are unwilling to relinquish the small pleasures in the name of longevity. According to a recent article in SEED, I don’t need to restrict my food intake to live to a ripe old age, because I can achieve the same results by . . . freezing my ass off. Well, okay, mice can. And that’s good enough for me.

. . . scientists knew that body temperature and aging were linked in reptiles and other cold-blooded animals. They also knew that the lifespan of mammals, or warm-blooded creatures, could be extended by reducing the number of calories they consume, which in turn lowers the body temperature by slowing down the metabolism.

[Researchers at Scripps University] carried out a study to determine whether calorie reduction was indeed responsible for extending animals' life, with a lowering of the body temperature being a secondary effect, or whether the latter was actually the cause of the increased longevity.

They found that “lowering the body temperature of mice without limiting the amount of food they consume can prolong their life by up to 20 percent for females and 12 percent for males.”

Well, thank god. No starvation for me. I’ll just walk around with my temperature controlled suit set to a bracing 33 degrees Fahrenheit, enjoying my pasta and fois grais, and dreaming of all those frigid years I have to look forward to.

Dear Neurontic

2006-11-06T15:09:00.000-05:00

Something I’ve always wondered about and never understood: Why do extreme emotions cause people to cry? Does this water-letting have some kind of biological function?

Moved to Tears, California

Dear Moved to Tears,

I too have always wondered about this phenomenon, but have never taken the time to find out. So, thanks for your letter. And we can both thank Wendy Norlund of Gibbs Magazine for providing the answer.

As it turns out, crying is a far more complex mechanism than you might imagine. There are actually three kinds of tears: Basal tears, which keep your eyes from drying up like a grape left out in the sun too long; Reflex tears, your body’s response to eye irritants, like onions and gasoline; and Psychic tears, the droplets produced when something provokes an emotional response. “When emotions affect us, the nervous system stimulates the cranial nerve in the brain and this sends signals to the neurotransmitters [controlling] the tear glands,” says Norlund, thus kickstarting the production of tears.

This explains ‘how’ emotions trigger tears. Now let’s turn to ‘why.’ I’m dating myself here, but after reading about psychic tears I can’t help thinking back to the movie Broadcast News. Those of you ancient enough to remember this film will recall that Holly Hunter’s character, Jane Craig, was in the habit of starting off each workday with a therapeutic bout of crying. She claimed it helped her deal with the day’s stresses. Well, it seems she was right. According to Norlund’s article “Laughter and Crying,”

Scientists have discovered that the emotional tears contain higher levels of manganese and the hormone prolactin, and this contributes [to] a reduction of both of these in the body; thus helping to keep depression away. Many people have found that crying actually calms them after being upset, and this is in part due to the chemicals and hormones that are released in the tears.

The lesson here? Free to Be You and Me’s feel good message contained a grain of scientific truth. It is all right to cry, cuz crying does, indeed, "get the sad outta you.”

Have a question for Neurontic? Email orlivan [at] gmail [dot] com.

Sunday's Silly Science Roundup

2006-10-29T15:26:00.000-05:00

This just in from the great minds at the University of Central Florida: Laws of physics, math debunk Hollywood portrayals of ghosts, vampires.

Using Isaac Newton's Laws of Motion, [UCF researchers] demonstrated that ghosts would not be able to walk and pass through walls [and] basic math disproves the legend of humans turning into vampires after they are bitten . . . because the entire human population in 1600 would have been wiped out in less than three years.

Time well spent guys--really.

The Art of Empathy

2006-10-27T10:51:00.000-04:00

The Frontal Cortex has an interesting post about a recent study conducted by psychologists at the University of Toronto on the effects of reading fiction. (Full disclosure here: I haven’t read the entire study, which was published in the October issue of The Journal of Research in Personality. I just can’t bring myself to fork over the money for a subscription at the moment. So, the following observations are based solely on the abstract, which you can read here.) The thrust of the study appears to be this: researchers found that avid fiction readers are more socially adept and empathetic than readers of nonfiction.

On its face, this seems counterintuitive. How does reading about imaginary people better prepare you for the real world than reading about actual corporeal beings? I don’t have the answer to this question, and, as far as I can tell, neither do the researchers. But I do have a theory.

The thing that separates fiction from nonfiction is fiction’s ability to transport the reader into the mind of another. Reading a psychologically astute work of fiction is the closest we ever get to experiencing the world through someone else’s eyes. No other art form offers us the level of access that fiction offers. You could argue that even real life doesn’t offer the kind of intimacy found in a good novel.

Think about your greatest love affair. The psychic fusion that accompanies new love can be engulfing. It often gives people the feeling of being “at one” with their beloved. But even during this peak emotional experience, we are very much alone in our own minds. Your loved one knows as much about your interior life as you are willing to offer up and vice versa. And as rule, our disclosures represent only a small portion of our experiences. Now contrast this with your knowledge of Jane Eyre’s interior life. If pressed, I imagine that those of you who’ve read the book could talk at length about Jane’s heartbreaks, her dreams, and her yearnings. Could you do the same for your partner? My guess is that you couldn’t, certainly not with the same level of confidence.

My point here is this: reading fiction is an inherently empathetic act. So, it makes perfect sense that regular readers of fiction would have a highly developed sense of empathy. Practice, as the old saying goes, makes perfect. It’s only logical that the ability to transcend your own ego and adopt the perspective of another, honed by reading fiction, translates into better people skills in the real world.

It occurred to me as I was reading the abstract that it would be interesting to find out how mirror neurons behave when someone is reading fiction. For the sake of brevity, I’ll spare you a long definition of mirror neurons here. (For more info, see “Psychic Cells.”) Put simply, mirror neurons are empathy neurons. When you perform an action, like throwing a baseball, for the first time, this behavior gets encoded in a clutch of brain cells. But scientists have recently discovered that these brain cells also fire when you see someone else perform the same action. These are mirror neurons. And they are sophisticated. In addition to responding to physical actions, they light up when you see someone experiencing an emotion that you’ve experienced. If someone is mourning the death of a pet, for instance, and you’ve dealt with a similar experience, your own “pet mourning” mirror neurons will light up in sympathy. My hunch is that mirror neurons also light up when you read about someone mourning a pet. This would explain why readers can summon up the feelings ascribed to fictional characters so easily. Mirror neurons make their emotions real to us.

I don’t mean to imply that nonfiction is fiction’s poor relation. Nonfiction has a different, but no less important, mandate. It is a powerful way of relaying information and bringing real life into clear focus. The importance of this can’t be overstated. But nonfiction writers aren’t afforded unlimited access to their subject’s interior lives. They can give you glimpses inside the minds of their characters, but they can’t allow you to step inside their heads for prolonged periods of time. And this, I think, explains why reading nonfiction doesn’t allow readers to exercise empathy to the same degree as fiction.

Of course, the masters of nonfiction (Joan Didion, Gay Talese, even John Krakauer) are capable of blurring the boundaries between fiction and nonfiction. They spend months – sometimes even years – immersing themselves in the lives of their subjects: gaining their trust, and analyzing their characters. The result is nonfiction that reads like fiction. Facts are presented in graphic detail, and thoughts and feelings are relived for the benefit of the reader. This requires painstaking attention to detail—a level of attention most nonfiction writers are unwilling or unable to invest.

*Virtual End Note*

I had the opportunity to talk to Gay Talese recently after he lectured at NYU. I asked him how he had been able to put himself so completely in the shoes of the boxer Floyd Patterson, a man he wrote about over the course of more than two decades. ‘How did you know what Patterson was thinking in a given moment,’ I asked? ‘I asked him,’ said Talese simply. Not once, but over and over again, several times a day, for years on end. Kinda makes writing fiction sound easy, doesn’t it?

'Trip' for your health

2006-10-13T15:46:00.000-04:00

Those who read “Psychedelic Pharmacology” may be interested to learn that Dr. Erika Dyck, a medical professor at the University of Alberta, is trumpeting the benefits of using LSD as a treatment for alcoholism. After surveying past research, Dyck found there was ample evidence to support the idea that “tripping” helps addicts achieve the level of emotional catharsis required to give up the drink.

She interviewed a handful of reformed alcoholics who used acid to kick the habit some 40 years ago and reported:

The LSD experience appeared to allow the patients to go through a spiritual journey that ultimately empowered them to heal themselves, and that's really quite an amazing therapy regimen.

(“LSD Treatment for Alcoholism Gets New Look")

Sort of puts a whole new spin on the idea of a gateway drug, doesn’t it?

Musings

2006-10-10T15:42:00.000-04:00

I find myself strangely obsessed with tracking the constant shuffle of Google Ads on the site lately. I worry a bit when Neurontic is papered with advertisements for suicide prevention hotlines, bargain-basement antidepressants, and therapy directories, as is the case when I spend too much time talking about depression treatments. I laugh when one posting that mentions the word ‘spaghetti’ results in a flood of links to pasta recipes. But I’m entirely perplexed by today’s top ranking ad: ‘God Ringtone.’

The ad instructs me to ‘send this ringtone to my phone right now!’ I can’t help wanting to. What exactly constitutes a ‘God’ ringtone anyway? Is it a George Burns voice over? A recording of a Latin mass? Is it sect specific? If you punch ‘3’ for Jewish, do you get a download of a famous cantor? Do agnostics just hear static? Kinda makes you think, doesn’t it?

***

A couple of things from last Sunday’s Times Magazine I wanted to direct your attention to:

*First, Charles Seibert’s brilliant article on the dissolution of elephant culture: “An Elephant Crackup?” Regular readers will recognize Seibert’s name from “Are rats laughing at us?” an examination of the burgeoning field of Animal Psychology. His latest article explores how humans have upset the delicate equilibrium of Pachyderm society by steadily annexing the elephant’s natural habitat, and decimating the elder members of herds in the name of population control and commerce (ivory).

It’s a truly tragic tale and one that has caught the attention of mainstream psychologists who normally reserve their attention for bipeds. Why? Because, as it turns out, young elephants from broken families exhibit many of the behaviors of human adolescents suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Elephants who have seen their nearest and dearest gunned down at an early age become despondent, antisocial, paranoid—and often violent (elephant attacks against humans have skyrocketed in recent years). If you think I’m anthropomorphizing, take a look: “An Elephant Crackup?”

*And in “The Long Zoom,” Steven Johnson writes about Spore, a much-anticipated new game from Will Wright, the creator of The Sims. Wright has spent the last six years building a system that will allow users to play god in the most literal sense. Each player begins as a “single-celled organism, swimming in a sea of nutrients.” If you successfully survive the attacks of a legion of plankton-sized predators you start to amass “evolutionary credits” and eventually earn the title of “Creator Editor.” At this point, you are free to enact your own Genesis. You populate your world with creatures of your own design; you govern their ecosystems, construct their cities, organize their economies; manage the competing demands of your own self-created nation-states, etc.

Johnson believes that Spore is singularly suited to our historical moment, because it epitomizes the peculiar way cybercitizens view the world. Most eras have distinct “ways of seeing,” he writes:

. . . the fixed perspective of Renaissance Art; the scattered collages of Cubism; the rapid-fire cuts introduced by MTV; and the channel-surfing of the ‘80s. Our own defining view is what you might call the long zoom: satellites tracking in on license plate numbers in spy movies; the Google maps in which a few clicks take you from the view of an entire region to the roof of your house . . . And this is not just a way of seeing but also a way of thinking, moving conceptually from the scale of DNA to the scale of personality all the way up to social movements and politics.

("The Long Zoom")

Spore, Johnson contends, is the perfect example of this brand of telescopic thinking. In Wright’s game, we begin by embodying one of the tiniest creatures on earth, an amoeba, but quickly morph into the all-seeing eye--a truly omnipotent god.

Johnson goes on to argue that this particular mode of seeing is beneficial, because it allows us to conceptualize the true interconnectedness of everything. We become virtual Buddhists, capable of recognizing how the extinction of a species of water bug in a swamp on one of our planets might contribute to the build up of green house gases on another; or how downturns in the Western economy can lead to war in the East.

According to Johnson, this crash course in synergistic thinking has the potential to make us better world citizens. He may be right. On the other hand, Spore could just as easily produce a generation of children with deeply entrenched God complexes. Who knows?

Plus, am I the only one who thinks this sounds like really hard work? I may be old-fashioned, but I generally warm up the old X-Box when I’ve had enough of real world concerns. The idea of spending my leisure hours recreating the universe from scratch strikes me as exhausting. I mean I couldn’t even get my Sim to go to work. He was so depressed he kept peeing on the floor. I’m not so sure I’m cut out for this whole deity thing.

Repliee: Live in the "flesh"

2006-10-02T15:31:00.000-04:00

A quick note to let all interested parties know that Repliee Q1expo, the latest thing in android science, is on display at this week's WIRED NEXTFEST in Manhattan.

If anyone out there has time for a fieldtrip, Neurontic would love to hear your impressions. Preliminary reports suggest that she's uncanny when sitting still, but bears a discomfitting resemblence to a wind up toy once set in motion.

Sex or Sanity?

2006-09-24T08:37:00.000-04:00

I'm writing an article about famed Anthropologist Helen Fisher's theory that the widespread use of Prozac and other SSRIs is jeopardizing mate selection and long-term bonding. For more on this see: Sex, Love, and SSRIs.

I'm searching for people willing to talk about how taking SSRIs has impacted their sex lives and long-term relationships. If any of you are interested, please get in touch: orlivan [at] gmail [dot] com. If you're concerned about having your personal life become part of public record, please don't let that stand in your way. We can talk about anonymity.

Bad Blogger

2006-09-17T10:07:00.000-04:00

My apologies to everyone for the continued silence. Neurontic's progenitors are in town and must be shown the sites.

Science has been decidedly unsilly this week. Good for science; bad for us.

In lieu of an actual entry, allow me to direct you to a couple of intriguing pieces from my compatriots in the blogosphere.

*Waynerad links to an heartening article on abc.net that indicates that scientists are *finally* starting to acknowledge that environment and experience count for more than genetics when it comes to personality: "Don't Blame Your Genes." Anyone who has read "Don't Be Afraid of Your Genes" knows this has long been my contention. The idea that our genes preempt self determination is incredibly dangerous. I'm happy to see scientists rallying around the idea of free will once again.

*In other news, Brain Waves showcases an interesting piece on the God Spot:

Speculation about the God Spot was triggered in 1997 when a team at the University of California, San Diego, saw that people with temporal-lobe epilepsy were prone to religious hallucinations which lead some researchers to stimulate temporal lobes artificially to see if he could induce a religious state. They found that this could create a "sensed presence".

This piques my interest because I'm currently reading Alice Flaherty's fascinating book on writer's block and hypergraphia, The Midnight Disease, which discusses the fact that furtive creativity is triggered by temporal lobe epilespy. The coincidence is enough to make me wonder if the God Spot (or at least neighboring regions) may be the Creation Spot, as well.

The Little Hiatus

2006-08-31T07:12:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the long silence, brain enthusiasts. Neurontic went on a brief expedition to California for a face-to-face with the brain detective-cum-neurologist V.S. Ramachandran. (More on this later . . .) We should be back on schedule very soon, in case you're jonesing for some silly science.

In the mean time, I'm pleased to announce that Neurontic has been featured in the latest edition of Encephalon, the blog carnival for the unapologetic brain geek. Other features include Mind Hacks take on Philip K. Dick's peculiarly appealing vision of psychosis in A Scanner Darkly, and Neurophilosopher's musings on what nanotechnology might mean for brain modeling.

Dear Neurontic

2006-08-20T12:18:00.001-04:00

I have some experience with depression, mostly mild although I have had a couple periods that could be described as major depressions. I know that my thoughts are intimately connected to my brain chemistry and that paying attention to how I'm thinking can alter my mood. For example, if I catch myself starting to feel depressed, I can pay attention to the conversations I'm having with myself and interrupt the thoughts that go something like "You worthless, useless, lazy slob". That, along with taking care of chores and projects I've been letting slide, and getting some exercise, usually help. But not always. Neurontic, can you explain what's going on when these remedial activities aren't working? Why am I sometimes powerless over depressive thoughts?

Got the Blues

Dear Got the Blues,

First off, I think we need to make a clear distinction between a perfectly healthy dip in mood and clinical depression (major depressive disorder). We don’t want to make the mistake of pathologizing sadness. Dark times are, after all, a normal part of life.

That said, if you are experiencing clinical depression, it’s important to identify it, and here’s link to the checklist psychiatrists use to diagnose depression: Symptoms of Depression.

If you find yourself experiencing some combination of these symptoms for longer than two weeks, I’d urge you to consult a doctor, not only because clinical depression can be so debilitating and painful, but also because it does a number on your brain.

Research has shown that prolonged clinical depression interrupts neurogenisis (the birth of new brain cells) in the hippocampus, a key player in memory storage. When depression goes untreated it can lead to shrinkage in the hippocampus, which causes memory impairment. Severe depression can also reduce activity in the frontal cortex (the logical/decision-making mind).

Put simply, chronic depression causes brain damage. But before you panic, know that Prozac has been shown to stimulate the growth of new brain cells in the hippocampus, and antidepressants as a whole, appear to restore normal functioning in the frontal cortex. In short, much of the damage caused by clinical depression is reversible if the illness is properly treated.

If you do find that you’re suffering from clinical depression and are uncomfortable with the idea of artificially altering your brain chemistry, I’d suggest looking into cognitive behavioral therapy. To date, CBT is the only form of talk therapy to be clinically tested (although Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel and the Ellison Medical Foundation are in the process of studying the physical impact of other forms of talk therapy).

Studies have shown that, when effective, CBT also works to reverse the damage done by clinical depression. Emory University’s Helen Mayberg (Much Ado About Area 25) conducted a study that showed that “cognitive behavior therapy is associated with a characteristic pattern of metabolic changes in the frontal cortex, cingulate, and hippocampus.” (NeuroPsychiatryReviews) Put simply, this means CBT has the same results as antidepressants, though it works far more slowly.

All of which is a really round about way of getting to your central question: Why are there times when I can’t talk myself out of depression?

The simple answer is that clinical depression hijacks your logical mind. If negative thoughts predominate for too long a feedback loop is established between the thinking mind (or frontal cortex) and your fear center (the limbic system). Negative thoughts continually trigger a flood of stress chemicals in the limbic system; these chemicals, in turn, trigger more negative thoughts. Ultimately, the thinking mind becomes so overwhelmed with trying to process painful feelings, it can do little else--hence reduced activity in the frontal cortex.

Helen Mayberg thinks she has identified the brain malfunction that keeps depressives stuck in this self-perpetuating cycle: area 25. (Much Ado About Area 25) Mayberg suspects that area 25 is the highway connecting the logical mind with the “feeling” mind. Area 25 has been shown to be hyperactive when people are in the grips of clinical depression. What does this mean? Essentially it means that during a major depressive episode, the emotional floodgates are left open for too long. Depressives are continually assaulted by painful feelings even when there appears to be no rational explanation for them.

Thankfully, this process can be interrupted. Antidepressants seem to work by catalyzing the production of the chemicals associated with “good feelings.” This eventually results in an upsurge of “good thoughts,” effectively restoring normal functioning in the frontal cortex (and the hippocampus). CBT appears to cause similar changes.

Deciding whether to use drugs or talk therapy (or some combination thereof) to treat your depression is a very personal choice. Obviously, if the depression was catalyzed by external events it’s imperative that they be dealt with, and talk therapy is undoubtedly one of the most effective ways to do that. That said, severe depression can compromise our vision of ourselves and our lives, and using medication in conjunction with therapy has been shown to improve the odds of recovery.

Have a question for Neurontic? Email orlivan [at] gmail [dot] com.

Sunday's Silly Science Roundup

2006-08-20T08:54:00.000-04:00

A collection of scientific findings that make you go "duh"--or simply "huh?"

It's been a banner week for sociologists people:

Penn State's Beth Montemurro, assistant professor of sociology, has accomplished something no one thought possible: she's turned watching stupid television into a respectable profession. After extensive "research," Montemurro has established beyond a shadow of a doubt that 'Bachelorette' viewers aren't seeking reality.

In other news, Sociologist Scott Yabiku of Arizona State University has "discovered" that "Lawns Make People Chatty." (Someone needs to check and see if this guy has ties to the landscaping industry.)

And, finally, Thomas Baker, of York University (in what I imagine must be a prime example of the old axiom "research is me-search") tells us that:

An ability to be open to new situations may predict intelligence earlier in life, but disagreeableness may predict intelligence later in life.

(From Personality Predictors Of Intelligence Change From Younger To Older Adulthood)

Much Ado About Area 25

2006-08-17T07:51:00.000-04:00

An estimated 16 percent of the American population will suffer from major depressive disorder at some point during life. The disease strikes down nearly 19 million Americans each year, and it’s likely to happen more than once. A whopping 50 percent will experience an encore performance within two years of their initial depressive “episode,” and the stats get even worse after the second recurrence.

What does this mean? It means that if you’re wired for depression, you’ll likely spend most of your adult life on some form of antidepressant—a fate that many do not relish given the side effects and philosophical ramifications. And that’s discounting entirely the 30 percent of depression sufferers who get no relief from the current crop of antidepressants. All of which explains why breakthroughs in our understanding of depression make for such good headlines. Millions of Americans are waiting for a quick fix for depression and the media wants to give them good news.

The current superstar of depression research is area 25. (See The New York Times, Scientific American Mind, NPR—the list goes on and on.)Yes, I know. It doesn’t sound very sexy. But trust me, it is. Here’s why: if current findings prove correct, area 25 may one day be the key to curing depression. Not managing depression, or blunting depression, or masking depression – as many argue the current crops of drugs do – but curing it.

For those who don’t spend their time geeking out over breakthroughs in mental health, allow me to explain. After years of researching the mechanics of depression, Emory University Neurologist Helen Mayberg noticed something unusual. If you looked at fMRI scans of depressive’s brains next to scans of healthy people’s brains, the depressed people’s showed two things: reduced activity in the frontal cortex, and hyperactivity in an obscure section of the brain known as area 25. Mayberg grew curious, so she did some scans of depressed people pre- and post-treatment. As she predicted, once the patient’s medications took effect, normal frontal cortex activity was restored, and area 25 showed decreased activity.

Mayberg’s began to suspect that area 25 served as gateway of sorts--the bridge between the part of the brain responsible for negative rumination (the frontal cortex) and the seat of anxiety and fear (the limbic system). She wondered whether psychiatric drugs worked because they unintentionally reduced activity in area 25. To test her thesis, she decided to perform an experiment on 12 subjects whose chronic depression had stubbornly withstood drugs, talk therapy, and frequent bouts of electroconvulsive therapy.

The only way to test her theory was to bore two holes into the skulls of her subjects and insert electrodes directly into their brains—a stark reminder that neuroscience is still in its infancy. Yes, it sounds barbaric, but Mayberg’s hope was that delivering a small jolt of electricity to this site would effectively reboot it. And it looks like she was right. Eight of her 12 subjects experienced relief, some instantaneously. Their melancholy evaporated as if by magic and it has yet to return. A quick shock to area 25 appears to lower the gateway between negative thoughts and painful feelings, effectively eliminating both the emotional and physiological components of depression.

All of this is good news and certainly worthy of note. If area 25 proves to be the conductor of depressive thoughts, learning how to regulate it could eventually render SSRIs and the like obsolete. But when The New York Times Magazine runs a cover story called the "The Depression Switch?" people are likely to jump to the conclusion that a cure for depression is just around the corner. And this is patently untrue. Even if Mayberg’s theory is born out in future studies, the average depression sufferer will have to wait years to reap the benefits.

Why? Because, at present, the only way to target area 25 is through invasive brain surgery. And, let’s face it, few among us would be willing to let a neurologist drill a hole in our heads and feed wires directly into our brains. Even if you were game, the odds of being admitted into one of Mayberg’s studies are very, very slight. So, the vast majority of depression sufferers will have to bide their time and wait for a drug capable of:

1) Overcoming the blood brain barrier, and
2) Effectively regulating activity in area 25.

To say that this is a Herculean task is a huge understatement. Right now, the only way scientists have found to breech the blood brain barrier (the barricade between the blood stream and the brain) is to design drugs that act like carpet bombs. SSRIs, for example, work by bathing the brain in serotonin. This has proven effective in alleviating depression in many people, but it also impacts the functioning of systems better left untouched (i.e., the dopamine pathways that control libido).

A drug capable of making a beeline for area 25 is going to be a long time coming. So while Mayberg’s findings offer hope to many, they won’t deliver relief for years to come.

**Virtual Endnote: I don’t mean to be a Gloomy Gus. Here’s some good news. There are more than 40 new antidepressants/anti-anxiety medications in development, a few of which are scheduled for release over the next 2-3 years. Many of these appear to have fewer sexual and physiological side effects than SSRIs. Neurontic will run a short piece on some of the most promising candidates at a future date.

How We Rate Phantom Spaghetti

2006-08-14T18:57:00.000-04:00

Okay, clearly Neurontic does not attract the carb-averse. Spaghetti was pretty high up on everyone's list. Answers ranged from a respectable '6' to a lip-smacking '10.'

I contacted a few of you to get the specs on your dinners and here's what I learned:

Yez, a reader after my own heart, gave the meal a perfect '10' and described it as follows:

I'm in a small family style restaurant in Italy. The pasta is something like linguini, and it is absolutely fresh. There is a really simple sauce that goes perfectly with the pasta, delicious veggies on the side and the heavenly Italian bread.

Jen R., Neurontic's favorite culinary student, felt her phantom spaghetti warranted a solid '8,' and said:

It would be marinara w/ fresh basil, onions and mushrooms, plus meatballs - topped with fresh grated Parm. The pasta would be bucatini - which is basically a hollow spaghetti. Ciabatta garlic bread, salad, wine; something simple for dessert. I'm at home, with friends coming over and we would probably eat around 8pm.

Geoff, who apparently isn't quite as noodle-obsessed as the rest of us, rated his dinner at '6,' and said:

"It would be a nice, hearty bolognese, with lamb and pork, mushrooms and lots of garlic."

Okay, so I think we can all agree that those three options sound scrumptious. Neurontic would personally be happy to join you for any or all of the above. But here's the thing, science is cruel. And for the purposes of this experiment, the spaghetti dinner would be somewhat less pleasant.

Your spaghetti would, in fact, be served cold -- in a tin can -- on the curb of dilapidated car park under an overpass in industrial Brooklyn. No sauce or condiments would be provided and several men with a penchant for cardboard box houses and screw-top wine would be your dinner companions. It would also be extremely soggy.

Now, I'd be willing to bet good money that you'd adjust your rating to about a '-1', given the chance. But it's too late. You can't, which is Gilbert's whole point: We make predictions about the level of satisfaction future events will give us based on very little information--and, more often than not, we're wrong.

Why? Because our imaginations are constantly in overdrive. We hear the word spaghetti and our mind's instantaneously sort through a vast storehouse of data about pasta and conjure up a scene that is likely to result in satisfaction. But this fantasy is assembled based on our past pasta experiences, not on our future pasta reality. When you rated your spaghetti dinner, you assumed two things:

a) That it would look a lot like previously enjoyed pasta dinners, and
b) That it would be fantastic.

The thrust of Gilbert's argument is that by investing too much faith in our imaginations we often overestimate the level of satisfaction that the future will bring. Conversely, when we paint a mental picture of something that evokes negative associations, like a public speaking engagment, our imagination lures us into assuming the worst. If public speaking has been filed in the "avoid" category, our brains will manufacture images of humiliation and mute panic.

In reality, our spaghetti dinner will likely be marginally less satisfying than expected (though likely not as awful as the one I described) and our speech will be less cringe worthy. The moral of the story: Don't confuse the future with the past.

I love this exercise because it reminds me just what a powerful tool the imagination is. As Gilbert says of his phantom spaghetti experiment:

Whatever you imagined, it's a pretty good bet that when I said spaghetti, you didn't have an unrequited urge to interrogate me about the nuances of sauce and locale before envisioning a single noodle. Instead, your brain behaved like a portrait artist commissioned to produce a full-color oil from a rough charcoal sketch, filling in all the details that were absent from my question and serving you a particular heaping helping of imaginary pasta.

(Stumbling on Happiness, 90)

The imagination may mislead us on occasion, but that makes it no less miraculous. Scientists are in the habit of saying the thing that separates human beings from the "lower" animals is langauge. If I were the one in charge of making grand proclamations, I'd say the truly singular thing about human beings is the ability to imagine.

Thought Experiment

2006-08-12T15:24:00.000-04:00

I'd like to replicate an experiment I recently read about in Harvard Psychologist Daniel Gilbert's new book Stumbling On Happiness, a philosophical tract masquerading as a self-help book.

Despite residing in the nose bleed section of the ivory tower, Gilbert is a lucid, common-sense thinker with some truly worthwhile insights regarding the human temperament. We'll delve into some of them at a later date. In the meantime, I wanted to give you a taste of the kind of "AHA" moments the book delivers.

Here's what you have to do:
1) Imagine you're going to have a spaghetti dinner tomorrow night.
2) Now try to predict how much satisfaction you'll get from this dinner and rate it on a scale of 1-10.
3) Post your answers in the comment box.

I'll be contacting posters over the next couple of days with a follow up question.

Unless no one posts--in which case,you will be left entirely in the dark with your phantom spaghetti.

Sunday’s Silly Science Roundup

2006-08-06T09:01:00.000-04:00

A new Neurontic feature, Sunday’s Silly Science Roundup showcases scientific findings that make you go “duh."

After spending a great deal of time and money, a group of researchers at University College London are willing to go out on a limb and say "Irrational Decisions are Based on Emotion."

Hellbent on convincing the two remaining skeptics in the developed world, scientists from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute conducted a long-term study proving that “TV Watching Lowers Physical Activity.”

This just in from the great minds at the Montreal Neurological Institute: “Anticipation Heightens Smoker’s Desire.” Man! Next they’ll be telling us that dieting makes you crave fatty foods.

Did I miss your favorite? Send it to orlivan@gmail.com.

More on the brain size debate: Part II

2006-07-30T14:32:00.000-04:00

While we’re on the subject of brain size, I wanted to share another interesting Temple Grandin theory. In Animals in Translation, Grandin suggests that we humans may be suffering from a species superiority complex. While she agrees that domestication was responsible for a 10 percent reduction in brain size in dogs, she contends that the civilizing process cut both ways. Taming wolves had a profound effect on the evolution of the human brain, according to Grandin.

Recent scientific findings suggest that human-wolf cohabitation began as long as 100,000 years ago. If these findings are correct, Grandin says:

Wolves and people were together at the point when homo sapiens had just barely evolved from homo erectus. When wolves and humans first joined together people only had a few rough tools to their name, and they lived in very small nomadic bands that probably weren’t any more socially complicated than a band of chimpanzees . . .

This means that when wolves and people first started keeping company they were on a lot more equal footing than dogs and people are today. Basically, two different species with complementary skills teamed up together, something that had never happened before and has never really happened since.

(Animals in Translation, 304-306)

This is more than a nostalgic ode to the ongoing love affair between humans and dogs. If our interspecies relationship does, in fact, date back this far, Grandin (among others) thinks it may provide the key to understanding how humans developed the complex social networks and behaviors that allowed them to thrive:

During all those years when early humans were associating with wolves they learned to act and think like wolves. Wolves hunted in groups: humans didn’t. Wolves had loyal same-sex and nonkin friendships; humans probably didn’t, judging by the lack of same-sex and nonkin friendships in every other primate species today . . .

Wolves, and then dogs, gave early humans a huge survival advantage . . . by serving as lookouts and guards, and by making it possible for humans to hunt big game in groups, instead of hunting small prey as individuals. Given everything wolves did for early man, dogs were probably a big reason why early man survived and Neanderthals didn’t. Neanderthals didn’t have dogs.

(Animals in Translation, 304-306)

Not feeling quite so paternalistic towards little Fifi now, are you? Or maybe you’re finding it hard to accept the idea that wolves may be responsible for inculcating us with the more humane aspects of human behavior. You certainly wouldn’t be the first. But before you dismiss Grandin’s theory, consider this:

Archaeologists have discovered that 10,000 years ago, just at the point when humans began to give their dogs formal burials, the human brain began to shrink. . . It shrank by 10 percent, just like the dog’s brain. And what’s interesting is what part of the human brain shrank. In all of the domestic animals the forebrain, which holds the frontal lobes, and the corpus callosum, shrank. But in humans it was the midbrain, which handles emotions and sensory data, and the olfactory bulbs, which handle smell.

(Animals in Translation, 304-306)

To Grandin, this suggests that “dog brains and human brains specialized: humans took over the planning and organizing tasks, and dogs took over the sensory tasks.”

Many scientists have greeted Grandin’s theory as heresy. But, before you rush to judgment, stop and think. Why would you assume that a relationship powerful enough to influence the development of the canine brain, would leave the human brain untouched? Given what we now know about the brain’s “plasticity,” it makes sense that a synergistic interspecies relationship like this would leave its mark on both species.

We, humans, are so accustomed to being at the top of the evolutionary pile, we find it difficult to remember that this wasn’t always the case. Us depend on dogs? Pishaw. But if you had to place a wager, who would you bet on to survive in the wild? A naked, pink-skinned biped with an oversized head and no sense of community, or a pack of mutually supportive runners with big teeth and built-in temperature control?