This Is Your Brain on Silence
One icy night in March 2010, 100 marketing experts piled into the Sea Horse Restaurant in Helsinki, with the modest goal of making a remote and medium-sized country a world-famous tourist destination.
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Get PocketOne icy night in March 2010, 100 marketing experts piled into the Sea Horse Restaurant in Helsinki, with the modest goal of making a remote and medium-sized country a world-famous tourist destination.
If you’re like most men living and working in a techno-service economy, you probably spend a good deal of your day sitting down. You go from the kitchen table to your desk at work to your chair in front of the TV.
In Vogue’s 1969 Christmas issue, Vladimir Nabokov offered some advice for teaching James Joyce’s “Ulysses”: “Instead of perpetuating the pretentious nonsense of Homeric, chromatic, and visceral chapter headings, instructors should prepare maps of Dublin with Bloom’s and Stephen’s inter
This summer, a friend called in a state of unhappy perplexity. At age 47, after years of struggling to find security in academia, he had received tenure. Instead of feeling satisfied, however, he felt trapped. He fantasized about escape. His reaction had taken him by surprise. It made no sense.
DESPITE great strides in prevention and treatment, cancer rates remain stubbornly high and may soon surpass heart disease as the leading cause of death in the United States.
Shara Yurkiewicz is a med student. She's doing rounds now, moving from department to department. Much of what she sees, she's seeing for the first time. Not yet a doctor, there are moments, many moments when she has the eyes of a patient. She gets scared. She feels helpless. She's too involved.
It's not just the fast food... This article originally appeared on AlterNet. Americans have become huge. Between the 1960s and the 2000s, Americans grew, on the average, an inch taller and 24 pounds heavier. The average American man today weights 194 pounds and the average woman 165 pounds.
There was a point in my life, back in 2005 and earlier, when I couldn’t exercise regularly. I really wanted to, I knew I should, but I couldn’t. Some of you might be in this boat today.
In the US, 80% of girls have been on a diet by the time they're 10 years old. In this honest, raw talk, neuroscientist Sandra Aamodt uses her personal story to frame an important lesson about how our brains manage our bodies, as she explores the science behind why dieting not only doesn't work, but is likely to do more harm than good. She suggests ideas for how to live a less diet-obsessed life, intuitively.
Six million Americans have panic disorder. Forty million have an anxiety disorder. So, if you're struggling with anxiety, you're absolutely not alone. Knowing how others manage their anxiety can be helpful. Below are the biggest lessons individuals have learned over the years.
AS soon as the CT scan was done, I began reviewing the images. The diagnosis was immediate: Masses matting the lungs and deforming the spine. Cancer. In my neurosurgical training, I had reviewed hundreds of scans for fellow doctors to see if surgery offered any hope.
There are a handful of junctures in life when a person’s sense of purpose is prone to twinkle and fade. In unemployment or professional stagnation; in financial or romantic straits, or after the death of a loved one; and, predictably, in retirement.
We've been told over and over that eight hours constitutes a full night's rest. Our bodies tell a different story This article originally appeared on AlterNet. I’ve always been at odds with sleep. Starting around adolescence, morning became a special form of hell.
Our cell phones and tablets have transformed the way we hold our bodies—and not for the better. Looking down at your device is like having a 60-pound weight on your neck, according to a spine surgeon.
How men and women digest differently, diet changes our skin, and gluten remains mysterious: A forward-thinking gastroenterologist on eating one's way to "gutbliss" Robynne Chutkan, MD, is an integrative gastroenterologist and founder of the Digestive Center for Women, just outside of Washington, D.
The activity of hundreds of genes was altered when people's sleep was cut to less than six hours a day for a week. Writing in the journal PNAS, the researchers said the results helped explain how poor sleep damaged health.
It was breakfast time and the people participating in a study of red meat and its consequences had hot, sizzling sirloin steaks plopped down in front of them. The researcher himself bought a George Foreman grill for the occasion, and the nurse assisting him did the cooking.
Your skin shouldn't look like a package of pork cracklins after spending the day outdoors; that's why we invented sunscreen. However, there's a right way and a wrong way to slather on your protection—screw it up and you could get burned.
A No. 1 bestseller by a respected physician argues that gluten and carbohydrates are at the root of Alzheimer's disease, anxiety, depression, and ADHD. What to make of the controversial theory? So asks Dr.
Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness. This isn’t meant as an insult, but you are physiologically lazy. So am I. So are we all.
So you want to keep an eye on the old waistline, but you hate diets. Join the club. Rather than give you recipes for yummy quinoa-kelp granola, we suggest following these simple rules, rituals, and metabolic sleights of hand.
It all started with a bet. People were naturally curious when they saw my new setup and started to bet that I wouldn’t last at my new standing desk for more than three months. Trash-talking ensued and money and offers for dinner were promised.
Do you ever recount seeing them slouching or maintaining bad posture even once? Maintaining proper posture is more than just about spine or wrist health. It’s a reflection of your inner feelings.
Now that the holidays are creeping around the corner, you may have to break up with your regularly scheduled sweat sessions, at least temporarily.
Editor's Note: This story is part of 5 Habits Changes You Can Actually Make In 2015. Check out the full list here. The brain is fundamentally a lazy piece of meat, according to neuroscientist Gregory Berns.
Exercise: most of us hate it and wish we did it more often. The key? Finding a routine that doesn't take too long but also doesn't try to pack two hours of work into four minutes, leaving you feel like you're lucky to be alive.
Gretchen Reynolds on the science of fitness. In an eye-opening demonstration of nature’s ingenuity, researchers at Princeton University recently discovered that exercise creates vibrant new brain cells — and then shuts them down when they shouldn’t be in action.
Don't have an hour or even twenty minutes to exercise each day? You might not need it. This routine of 12 exercises is a complete workout based on the latest fitness research—and it only takes 7 minutes.