Humans identify and call each other by specific names. So far this advanced cognitive behavior has only been identified in a few other species, dolphins, elephants, and some parrots. Interestingly, it has never been documented in our closest relatives, non-human primates – that is, until now. A recent study finds that marmoset monkeys have unique […] The post Marmosets Call Each Other By Name first appeared on NeuroLogica Blog ..read more

I am not the first to say this but it bears repeating – it is wrong to use the accusation of a mental illness as a political strategy. It is unfair, stigmatizing, and dismissive. Thomas Szasz (let me say straight up – I am not a Szaszian) was a psychiatrist who made it his professional […] The post Accusation of Mental Illness as a Political Strategy first appeared on NeuroLogica Blog ..read more

Gotta love the title of this paper: “A critical hit: Dungeons and Dragons as a buff for autistic people“. Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) is a tabletop roleplaying game where a small group of people each play characters adventuring in an imaginary world run by the dungeon master (DM). (That explanation was probably not necessary for […] The post Roleplaying Games May Help Autistic People first appeared on NeuroLogica Blog ..read more

Often times the answer to a binary question is “yes”. Is artificial intelligence (AI) a powerful and quickly advancing tool or is it overhyped? Yes. Are opiates useful medicines or dangerous drugs? Yes. Is Elon Musk a technological visionary or an eccentric opportunist? This is because the world is usually more complex and nuanced than our false dichotomy or false choice simplistic thinking. People and things can contain disparate and seemingly contradictory traits – they can be two things at the same time. This was therefore my immediate reaction to the question – are AI companions a potentia ..read more

If either of the two presumptive nominees for the major political parties in the US are elected in November they will be the oldest person ever to be inaugerated as president. What implications does this have? As a neurologist who sees patients every workday of various ages, evaluates them, and explicitly investigates the effects of aging on their function, I have some thoughts. The first thing to realize is that aging affects different people differently. Especially once people get north of 40 you start to see significant and growing divergence in how well people age, in terms of their health ..read more

This is a great scientific question because it challenges how we ask and answer scientific questions. Are animals conscious? This is a question discussed in a recent BBC article that peaked my interest. They eventually get to a question that they should have opened with – how do we specifically define “consciousness”? We can’t answer questions about an alleged phenomenon unless we know what it is. Ideally we would have an operational definition, a list of inclusion and exclusion criteria that need to be met to fit the definition. So I am going to start with this question – how do we define con ..read more

We are rapidly entering the era of neuromodulation – using electrical and magnetic fields in order to increase or decrease the activity of specific regions and circuits in the brain. Such treatments are already shown to be effective in treating some Parkinson’s symptoms, depression, OCD, migraines, and other neurological and psychiatric conditions. Computational models of brain anatomy and the connectome have dramatically increased the utility of neuromodulation. We are still on the steep part of the curve, and it will be interesting to see how far this modality goes in the next 10-20 years. B ..read more

One of the most difficult situations that a person can face is to have a loved-one in a critical medical condition and have to make life-or-death medical decisions for them. I have been in this situation many times as the consulting neurologist, and I have seen how weighty this burden can be on family members. Advanced directives are helpful, but they cannot predict every possible situation or anticipate every medical nuance, so still, decisions have to be made. One thing is also clear – the better we are able to predict outcomes, the easier decision-making becomes. Uncertainty is the most dif ..read more

When I use my virtual reality gear I do practical zero virtual walking – meaning that I don’t have my avatar walk while I am not walking. I general play standing up which means I can move around the space in my office mapped by my VR software – so I am physically walking to move in the game. If I need to move beyond the limits of my physical space, I teleport – point to where I want to go and instantly move there. The reason for this is that virtual walking creates severe motion sickness for me, especially if there is even the slightest up and down movement. But researchers are working on ways ..read more

Scientists have developed virtual reality goggles for mice. Why would they do this? For research. The fact that it’s also adorable is just a side effect. One type of neuroscience research is to expose mice in a laboratory setting to specific tasks or stimuli while recording their brain activity. You can have an implant, for example, measure brain activity while it runs a maze. However, having the mouse run around an environment puts limits on the kind of real time brain scanning you can do. So researchers have been using VR (virtual reality) for about 15 years to simulate an environment while ..read more