The Neccessity of Selective Attention

Three decades ago, cognitive scientist Colin Martindale advanced the idea that each of us has several subselves, and he connected his idea to emerging ideas in cognitive science. Central to Martindale’s thesis were a few fairly simple ideas, such as selective attention, lateral inhibition, state-dependent memory, and cognitive dissociation. Although there are billions of neurons in our brains firing all the time, we’d never be able to put one foot in front of the other if we were unable t...

 Walking is Good for the Brain

Have you ever wondered why one of the most difficult things to teach a robot to do is to walk on two legs? It turns out there's a reason. Apparently, the simple act of walking turns out not to be so simple after all. Professor Florentin Worgotter of the University of Gottingen in Germany explains why teaching a robot to walk on bumpy terrains like cobblestones is so challenging: "Releasing the spring-like movement at the right moment in time—calculated in milliseconds—and to get the d...

 Richard Feynman Describes the Waves Running Through Our E...

Try to imagine what the electric and magnetic fields look like at present in the space of this lecture room. First of all, there is a steady magnetic field; it comes from the currents in the interior of the earth - that is, the earth's steady magnetic field. Then there are some irregular, nearly static electric fields produced perhaps by electric charges generated by friction as various people move about in their chairs and rub their coat sleeves against the chair arms. Then there are other m...