| ABOUT | SHOW NOTES | EPISODE LIST | GUEST LIST | TRANSCRIPTS | BIBLIOGRAPHY |
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The latest episode of the Brain Science Podcast (BSP 107) is an interview with Dr. Penelope Lewis, author of The Secret World of Sleep: The Surprising Science of the Mind at Rest.
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Ginger Campbell with Rusty and GretaEarlier this month my Brain Science Podcast celebrated its seventh anniversary. I haven't been doing a very good job of updating this website in recent months, but I wanted to take a moment to look back at 2013. While I only published two episodes of Books and Ideas, I did publish 12 episodes of the Brain Science Podcast and I am looking forward to some major changes in 2014.
BSP 103 featured the return of Olaf Sporns who was also interviewed back in BSP 74. Last month we talked about his most recent book Discovering the Human Connectome.
BSP 104 is our seventh annual review episode, which highlights the main ideas that we explored in 2013. I also announced that beginning on December 30, 2013 I will be offering a Premium Subscription. The most recent 25 episodes of the Brain Science Podcast will remain free while older episodes and episode transcripts will be available via subscription. Subscribers will get unlimited access to the entire library of content while individual episodes and transcripts can be purchased on the BSP website.
Thanks to a library of 100+ episodes the Brain Science Podcast is now averaging over 100,000 downloads per month and recently passed 5 million downloads.
I am particularly grateful to all my loyal listeners who have helped the show grow by sharing it with others.
The Brain Science Podcast has a discussion group at Goodreads.com, a Fan Page on Facebook and a page on Google+.
If you haven't checked it out yet I hope you will.
Alvaro FernandezLast month I posted episode 100 of the Brain Science Podcast. To celebrate this milestone I supplemented the discussion of Brain Fitness with Alvaro Fernandez with feedback from listeners.
Visit the Brain Science Podcast website for the full show notes and free episode transcript.
Comment: During the interview with Alvaro Fernandez he talked about the upcoming SharpBrains Virtual Summit, which is scheduled for September 19-20. Fans of the Brain Science Podcast have been offered a 25% discount. Just use the code brainpodcast when you register.
photo by Rosalie WinwardLast month in BSP 98 I reviewed Temple Grandin's latest book The Autistic Brain: Thinking Across the Spectrum. That podcast focused on the current science, but this month's follow up interview (BSP 99) is a little different. It focuses on Dr. Grandin's practical advice for living with autism. Besides emphasizing the need for more research into the sensory problems that are common in autism and applying the recent discoveries about brain plasticity. Dr. Grandin believes very strongly in nurturing strengths while accommodating weaknesses. She said that it is very important that "we accommadate weaknesses in a way that is enabling." She is particularly worried that many young people are not being taught the social skills they need to succeed in a work environment, even thought they have valuable talents to contribute.
In my opinion, Dr. Grandin's advice carries extra weight because her personal example shows how an autistic person can make a unique contribution if given extensive training and support.
Listen to Dr. Grandin's interview.
Visit Brain Science Podcast website for full show notes and a free episode Transcript.
Disgust is an universal emotion, but unlike emotions like fear and anger, disgust must be learned. This is the main conclusion of Dr. Rachel Herz's latest book That's Disgusting: Unraveling the Mysteries of Repulsion. In a recent interview (BSP 86) Dr. Herz told me why she spent the last several years studying this rather unusual subject. We also discussed what the study of disgust can tell us about how our brains process emotion.
This is Dr. Herz's second visit to the Brain Science Podcast. Back in BSP 34 we talked about her first book The Scent of Desire: Discovering Our Enigmatic Sense of Smell.
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In his latest book Who's in Charge?: Free Will and the Science of the Brain respected neuroscientist Michael S. Gazzaniga explores how the discoveries of neuroscience impact how we see ourselves as human beings. After providing a brief review of 20th century neuroscience, and even some of the work from the past decade, Dr. Gazzaniga concludes that nothing neuroscience has discovered changes the fact that "we are personally responsible agents and are to be held accountable for our actions."
Gazzaniga's position contrasts with those who think that recent discoveries show that the brain creates the mind in solely "upwardly causal" way, and who argue that since much of what our brain does is outside our conscious awareness or control, we should not be held responsible for our actions. Who's in Charge?: Free Will and the Science of the Brain presents what I think is a convincing argument against this common position.
In the latest episode of the Brain Science Podcast (BSP 82) I present a detailed discussion of Dr. Gazzaniga's book.
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In his new book Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain neuroscientist David Eagleman describes consciousness as "the smallest player in the operations of the brain" (page 5) because most of what the brain does is outside conscious awareness (and control). In a recent interview (BSP 75) Dr. Eagleman reviews some of the evidence for this startling position as well as the implications both for the average person and for social policy.
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Olaf Sporns, PhDNetworks of the Brain by Olaf Sporns is an excellent comprehensive introduction to the use of Network Theory to study both the brain and the nervous systems of invertebrates. In Episode 74 of the Brain Science Podcast I interviewed Dr. Sporns (Indiana University) about some of the key ideas in his book. Network Theory is becoming increasingly important as a tool for dealing with the massive amaounts of data being generated by current techniques, such as brain imaging. It is also a valuable tool with dealing with the fact that nervous systems consist of multiple scales (from the molecular level up to billions of neurons), which can not be reduced to a single scale.
While Networks of the Brain will be of greatest interest to those working in neuroscience and to those with a background in fields like engineering, mathematics, and computer science, this interview provides an introduction for listeners of all backgrounds.
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Recent research has discovered that glial cells (the non-neuronal cells that make up about 85% of the cells in the human nervous system) actually do more than just support neurons. In Episode 69 of the Brain Science Podcast I explore some of these recent discoveries with pioneering researcher, R. Douglas Fields, PhD. Dr. Fields is the author of The Other Brain: From Dementia to Schizophrenia, How New Discoveries about the Brain Are Revolutionizing Medicine and Science. The Other Brain provides a compelling introduction to this exciting new field. It is aimed at general readers, but it should also be on the must-read list for all students of neuroscience.
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Episode 65 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Jaak Panksepp, PhD, author of Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions. Dr. Panksepp has done pioneering work on the neural origins of emotions. In this interview we discuss how his work challenges some of the common assumptions about emotions and some of the important implications of his discoveries. New listeners may want to go back and listen to Episode 11 for an introduction to the neuroscience of emotion.
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Episode 64 of the Brain Science Podcast is our Third Annual Review Episode.
It includes a review of some of the major ideas we talked about in 2009 and a look ahead to what I have planned for 2010.
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Episode 63 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with David Bainbridge, author of Teenagers: A Natural History. Our focus is on how the brain changes during the teenage years. Bainbridge teaches vetinary anatomy and reproductive biology at Cambridge University and has published several other popular science books including Beyond the Zonules of Zinn: A Fantastic Journey Through Your Brain, which I discussed back in Episode 32.
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Episode 62 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Warren Brown, PhD, co-author (with Nancey Murphy) of Did My Neurons Make Me Do It?: Philosophical and Neurobiological Perspectives on Moral Responsibility and Free Will. This book was discussed in detail back in Episode 53, but this interview gave me a chance to discuss some of the book's key ideas with Dr. Brown. We focused on why a non-reductive approach is needed in order to formulate ideas about moral responsibility that are consistent with our current neurobiological understanding of the mind.
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Episode 58 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with philosopher Alva Noë, whose book Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons from the Biology of Consciousness argues persuasively that our Minds are MORE than just our brains. He says that "the brain is necessary but not sufficient" to create the mind. Read more...
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Episode 57 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with neuropsychologist Dr. Chris Frith, author of Making up the Mind: How the Brain Creates Our Mental World. Our brain processes information about the world outside us (via our senses) in the same way that it processes information from within our bodies and from our own mental world. In this interview Dr. Frith and I explore the implications from recent discoveries about how our brain generates our mental world.
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Send feedback to Dr. Campbell at gincampbell at mac.com or join the Discussion Forum at http://brainscienceforum.com.
Episode 56 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with neuroscientist, Eve Marder, PhD. Dr. Marder has spent 35 years studying the somatogastric ganglion of the lobster. In this interview we talk about how she got into neuroscience during its early days, her recent tenure as president of the Society for Neuroscience, and how some of her key discoveries have implications for studying more complex nervous systems.
Episode Transcript (coming soon)
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Episode 55 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with highly respected philosopher Patricia Churchland. Churchland is the author of Neurophilosophy and Brain. She is currently on the faculty of the University of California at San Diego and she was a featured speaker at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in 2008.
In this interview we talked about neurophilosophy, which is an approach to philosophy of mind that gives high priority to incorporating the empiric findings of neuroscience. We also talk about the evolving relationship between philosophy and neuroscience. Churchland shares her enthusiasm for how the discoveries of neuroscience are changing the way we see ourselves as human beings. We also talked a little about the issues of reductionism that I first brought up in Episode 53.
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Brain Science Podcast #54 is an interview with Dr. Michael Merzenich, one of the pioneers of neuroplasticity. We talk about how the success of the cochlear implant revealed unexpected plasticity in adult brains and about how brain plasticity can be tapped to improve a wide variety of problems including dyslexia, autism, damage from disease and injury. Healthy people of all ages can also tap the resource of brain plasticity to help maintain and improve their mental functions.
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Listen to Episode 82