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Unsheltered
Over the past several weeks, I have found myself riveted by the protests in Egypt and across the Middle East, just as I was by the Iranian protests of 2009. I’ve watched the footage of chanting...
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Good Morning, Sleepyhead
A few weeks ago, I passed out. One moment I was standing by the door to our apartment, wishing my departing husband a good day at work. The next, my eyes had rolled back in my head and I fell...
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The Little Glacier That Could
My husband and I just returned from an Alaskan cruise. Yes, life is cruel. We ate dessert at every meal, had our very own butler, and enjoyed every type of hedonistic frivolity. We also experienced...
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Guessing at Sex
Something’s happened. Something both miraculous and mundane. Over the past few months I’ve been transformed from a woman into an incubator. A walking, talking (and often eating and napping) incubator...
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Full of Mind
There’s that term again. Mindfulness. It seems to pop up everywhere these days, like the phrase “Don’t have a cow” did in the early 90’s. Like the concept of free love in the 60’s, or isolationism of...
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Dreaming of Me
My belly button has all but disappeared. In its place, an odd little pillow of skin lies flush with the rest of my stomach. A dark line – the linea nigra – now runs down the length of my abdomen,...
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Tooling Around
There was a time when my daughter used her hands exclusively to shovel things into her mouth. Not so anymore. For the last few months, she has been hard at work banging objects together. This simple...
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Sandy, Science, and a New Campaign
As Tuesday’s election approaches and news coverage of super storm Sandy recedes, I’m struck by the absurdity of our current situation. While cities on the East Coast are still pumping water out of...
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The End of History
I just read a wonderful little article about how we think about ourselves. The paper, which came out in January, opens with a tantalizing paragraph that I simply have to share: “At every stage of life,...
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My Body or Yours?
Today we’re talking bodies. Not how they look in skinny jeans or whether they can win a Tour de France without steroids. We’re talking about how it feels to have a body of your own, one that is (or...
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Plastic and the Developing Brain
When I was pregnant with my daughter, I had enough on my mind. I didn’t have much time to think much about plastic. I knew vaguely that plastics can release estrogen-mimicking substances like...
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Modernity, Madness, and the History of Neuroscience
I recently read a wonderful piece in Aeon Magazine about how technology shapes psychotic delusions. As the author, Mike Jay, explains: Persecutory delusions, for example, can be found throughout...
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Delusions: Making Sense of Mistaken Senses
For a common affliction that strikes people of every culture and walk of life, schizophrenia has remained something of an enigma. Scientists talk about dopamine and glutamate, nicotinic receptors and...
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Outsourcing Memory
Do you rely on your spouse to remember special events and travel plans? Your coworker to remember how to submit some frustrating form? Your cell phone to store every phone number you’ll ever need?...
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How People Tawk Affects How Well You Listen
People from different places speak differently – that we all know. Some dialects and accents are considered glamorous or authoritative, while others carry a definite social stigma. Speakers with a New...
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The Changing Face of Science: Part Two
In my last post, I wrote about how scientists are beginning to engage with the public, particularly via social media and blogs. Here, I will use my recent experiences at the AAAS conference to...
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In the Blink of an Eye
It takes around 150 milliseconds (or about one sixth of a second) to blink your eyes. In other words, not long. That’s why you say something happened “in the blink of an eye” when an event passed so...
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The Slippery Question of Control in OCD
It’s nice to believe that you have control over your environment and your fate – that is until something bad happens that you’d rather not be responsible for. In today’s complex and interconnected...
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Did I Do That? Distinguishing Real from Imagined Actions
If you’re like most people, you spend a great deal of your time remembering past events and planning or imagining events that may happen in the future. While these activities have their uses, they also...
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What Do Preschoolers Learn from Fantastical Picture Books?
One of the new picture books making the bedtime rounds at our house is How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?, which describes and depicts dinosaurs doing such un-dinosaurly things as tucking themselves into...
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