Brain Science

What do obesity, insulin resistance, diabetes, fatty liver disease, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, stroke, neurological disorders, and premature death have in common? All can be stoked by high uric acid levels. Our most respected scientific literature is bursting with evidence that elevated uric acid levels lie at the root of many pervasive health conditions, but mainstream medicine for the most part remains unaware of this connection.

Zombies love to feast on brains and flesh - so do some organisms in nature! Listeners will learn all about creatures that eat brains.

Written by two world-renowned sleep and dream researchers, When Brains Dream debunks common myths while acknowledging the mysteries that persist around both the science and experience of dreaming.

We’ve all heard the phrase “it’s not brain surgery.” But what exactly is brain surgery? It’s a profession that is barely a hundred years old and profoundly connects two human beings, but few know how it works, or its history. In this warm, rigorous, and deeply insightful book, Dr. Theodore H. Schwartz explores what it’s like to hold the scalpel, wield the drill, extract a tumor, fix a bullet hole, and remove a blood clot—when every second can mean life or death.

We all want to help students learn to read, but what happens when 67 percent of children don’t get that chance? 2022 National Report Card data shows that is the reality in the United States right now. But it does not have to be this way!

In this, his magnum opus, the world’s best known skeptic and critical thinker Dr. Michael Shermer—founding publisher of Skeptic magazine and perennial monthly columnist (“Skeptic”) for Scientific American—presents his comprehensive theory on how beliefs are born, formed, nourished, reinforced, challenged, changed, and extinguished.

A riveting investigation of the myriad ways that parasites control how other creatures - including humans - think, feel, and act. These tiny organisms can live only inside another animal, and, as McAuliffe reveals, they have many evolutionary motives for manipulating their host's behavior. Far more often than appreciated, these puppeteers orchestrate the interplay between predator and prey.

Self-control may be the least-coveted fruit of the Spirit. But the truth is that people who are successful at self-control have freer, happier lives, and we all want that. After all, our bad habits - from the slight to the serious - bring with them a host of negative emotions, take up our time, and keep us from being the best version of ourselves.

Neuroscientists estimate that over 90 percent of our operating systems - beliefs, behaviors, patterns - are unconscious. Since the surface story determines less than 10 percent of our decisions, how can we illuminate the shadow story responsible for over 90 percent of what we do each day? Once we systematically understand our relationship with money, can we overcome the mind and brain’s resistance to change? Especially when so many of the current popular strategies for change are contrary to the way the mind and brain work?

Every year failed change costs billions of dollars. We are biologically wired to resist change: It's the key to our survival and the obstacle that often gets in the way of us fulfilling our potential. Wired to Resist provides a new understanding of our biology and why change fails, despite our best plans. Dr. Andreatta synthesizes the latest research into a new model for change that harnesses the power of neuroscience and shows you how to thrive and lead through all kinds of change.

Story isn't just one way to persuade. It's the way. It's built into the architecture of the brain, and has been since early humans gathered around the camp fire, trying to figure out how to outsmart the lion next door. In Story or Die, story coach Lisa Cron sets out to decode the power of story, first by examining how the brain processes information, translates it into narrative, and then guards it as if your life depends on it.

Medical treatment for ADHD fails much too often - not because of the drugs themselves, but how they are given. New ADHD Medication Rules - Brain Science & Common Sense shows that patients can react very differently to ADHD prescriptions, resulting in missed diagnoses, imbalanced treatment and over or under medication.

Gazing at the stars, falling in love, or listening to music, we sometimes feel a transcendent connection with a cosmic unity and things larger than ourselves. But these experiences are not easily understood by science, which holds that all things can be explained in terms of atoms and molecules. Is there space in our scientific worldview for these spiritual experiences?

Neuroscientist Explains Brain and AI: How the Brain and AI Learn Via Deep Learning is a captivating exploration of the groundbreaking field of deep learning, presented from both the perspective of human brain function and the rapidly advancing world of artificial intelligence. Author Dr. Tursun Alkam, a neuroscientist with over two decades of experience, guides listeners through the intricacies of neural networks and hierarchical learning, using relatable analogies and real-world examples to make complex concepts accessible to teen and young adult listeners.

Dr. Faith G. Harper explains the emerging science of the gut-brain connection and the vagus nerve so that everyone can understand what’s going on in your body and how to make friends with it again, especially if you’ve experienced trauma or chronic stress. Filled with straight talk and practical exercises so you can reconnect with your physical needs and reactions, work through body shame, manage illness and disability, and implement small changes that make a huge difference in how you feel every day. You are a whole person, and it’s time to reconnect with yourself!

An "elegant", "engrossing" (Carol Tavris, Wall Street Journal) examination of what we think we know about the brain and why - despite technological advances - the workings of our most essential organ remain a mystery.

Throughout history, two perspectives on the world have dueled in our minds: the extrinsic—that of mechanism and physics—and the intrinsic—that of feelings, thoughts, and ideas. The intrinsic perspective allows us to tell stories about our lives, to chart our anger and our lust, to understand our psychologies. The extrinsic allows us to chart the physical world, to build upon it, and to travel across it. These perspectives have never been reconciled; they almost seem to exist on different planes of thought.

Weaving insights from philosophy, neuroscience, and history into a rich narrative, The Shallows explains how the internet is rerouting our neural pathways, replacing the subtle mind of the book reader with the distracted mind of the screen watcher. A gripping story of human transformation played out against a backdrop of technological upheaval, The Shallows will forever alter the way we think about media and our minds.

In Practice the Pause, spiritual director and writer Caroline Oakes offers easy-to-understand explanations of how this new brain science is confirming what every spiritual tradition has been telling us for millennia: by practicing the pause, we become more self-aware and better able to understand others.

The placebo effect, what is it and does it truly work? What are its health advantages, its medical benefits? What about weight loss and wrinkle creams? Is it your brain, or the supplement working? Is this a victory of your brain, or is this a win for medicine? Does the Placebo effect associate itself with hypnosis? How does it fit in with subconscious thinking? This book will teach you what multiple sclerosis is and how to comprehend its various subtypes and treatments.