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Does Your Brain Need Santa Claus?

Learningtogo

One key to understanding why magical thinking exists is to understand the brain’s capacity to predict future events based on past experience. The brain does this by paying attention to changes in the environment and linking current and past events together to build a reliable model of the world. The brain is still a gigantic mystery.

Brain 130
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Does Your Brain Need Santa Claus?

Learningtogo

One key to understanding why magical thinking exists is to understand the brain’s capacity to predict future events based on past experience. The brain does this by paying attention to changes in the environment and linking current and past events together to build a reliable model of the world. The brain is still a gigantic mystery.

Brain 130
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article thumbnail

Does Your Brain Need Santa Claus?

Learningtogo

In fact, it may be a coping mechanism invented by the brain to help us explain the world. We know that our brains have evolved to become “ survival machines ,” so how does an illogical belief keep us alive? One theory is that these myths help our brain perform its primary function – to keep us alive.

Brain 113
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The Eyes Have It – How the Brain Uses Our Eyes to See the World

Learningtogo

As I look for practical applications of neuroscience, I sometimes stumble upon things we believe at some instinctual level that we can now say we “know” because of evidence uncovered in a living brain. As a learning professional, I’m also aware of the enormous amount of information that comes to the brain directly through our eyes.

Brain 124
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My brain is racist. Does that mean I am?

CLO Magazine

But what if we understood the moniker not as a scarlet letter of disgrace, but a brain default that we all share? The only way our brains know how: Recognize and respond. To wit, there are two primary reasons my brain defaults to racist thinking. The brain accomplishes this feat, in part, by recognizing (or not) the familiar.

Brain 92
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Ho Ho Ho! Why Your Brain Needs Santa Claus

Learningtogo

In fact, it may be a coping mechanism invented by the brain to help us explain the world. We know that our brains have evolved to become “ survival machines ,” so how does an illogical belief keep us alive? One theory is that these myths help our brain perform its primary function – to keep us alive.

Brain 133
article thumbnail

Does Your Brain Need Santa Claus?

Learningtogo

In fact, it may be a coping mechanism invented by the brain to help us explain the world. We know that our brains have evolved to become “ survival machines ,” so how does an illogical belief keep us alive? One theory is that these myths help our brain perform its primary function – to keep us alive.

Brain 100