Insight
The Placebo Effect Is Real Biology, Even When You Know It Is a Placebo
In 1799, a doctor in Bath named John Haygarth ran one of the first proper tests of a medical treatment. The treatment…
Humans
How the human body and mind work, from memory and the brain to the nerves, senses and quirks we all share.
All Humans publications
Insight
Insight
Why Yawns Are Contagious, and What a Yawn Might Actually Be For
You have probably yawned at least once since you started reading this, or you will before the end. That is the strange…
Insight
Why You Can’t Tickle Yourself: The Brain’s Own Prediction Engine
Try it right now. Run your own fingers along the bottom of your foot or under your arm, the exact spots that…
Insight
How General Anesthesia Actually Turns Off Consciousness (and Why We Still Don’t Fully Know How)
Every day, millions of people are put under general anesthesia, wheeled into an operating room, cut open, stitched back up, and wake…
Insight
The Vagus Nerve: The Body’s Longest Line of Communication
The vagus nerve doesn’t get talked about much outside of anatomy class, which is strange given what it actually does. It’s the…
Insight
Why Your Brain Rewrites a Memory Every Time You Recall It
Most people treat memory like a recording. You store an event once, and from then on you can play it back, slightly…