Popular Science

A fascinating exploration of the intricacies of how we remember, why we forget, and what we can do to protect our memories, from the Harvard-trained neuroscientist and bestselling author of Still Alice. Have you ever felt a crushing wave of panic when you can't for the life of yo...u remember the name of that actor in the movie you saw last week, or you walk into a room only to forget why you went there in the first place? If you're over forty, you're probably not laughing. You might even be worried that these lapses in memory could be an early sign of Alzheimer's or dementia. In reality, for the vast majority of us, these examples of forgetting are completely normal. Why? Because while memory is amazing, it is far from perfect. Our brains aren't designed to remember every name we hear, plan we make, or day we experience. Just because your memory sometimes fails doesn't mean it's broken or succumbing to disease. Forgetting is actually part of being human. In Remember, neuroscientist and acclaimed novelist Lisa Genova delves into how memories are made and how we retrieve them. You'll learn whether forgotten memories are temporarily inaccessible or erased forever and why some memories are built to exist for only a few seconds (like a passcode) while others can last a lifetime (your wedding day). You'll come to appreciate the clear distinction between normal forgetting (where you parked your car) and forgetting due to Alzheimer's (that you own a car). And you'll see how memory is profoundly impacted by meaning, emotion, sleep, stress, and context. Once you understand the language of memory and how it functions, its incredible strengths and maddening weaknesses, its natural vulnerabilities and potential superpowers, you can both vastly improve your ability to remember and feel less rattled when you inevitably forget. You can set educated expectations for your memory, and in doing so, create a better relationship with it. You don't have to fear it anymore. And that can be l
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A mother of small children avoids a murderer in broad daylight. A young dad is able to grieve for his lost baby - using a song. And it saves his marriage. What if there were parts of our minds which we never use, but if awakened, could make us so much happier, connected and alive...? What if awakening those parts could finally solve the conflicts and sufferings we all go through? From the cutting edge, where therapy meets neuroscience, world-renowned author, psychotherapist and educator Steve Biddulph shows us how to reach into the deep feelings beneath our feelings, and how doing so can guide us to a more awake and free way of living every minute of our lives. In Fully Human, Steve Biddulph guides us through the four-storey mansion of our unexplored mind, with tips on how to open each level up to the sunlight, allowing us to live equally in all its beautiful rooms. Drawing on deeply personal stories from his own life, as well as those of his clients, and from the frontiers of thinking about how the brain works with the body, this culmination of a life's work uncovers how we can all be more alive, more connected. More Fully Human. From the bestselling Australian author of Raising Boys.
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A gritty, dark tale of infectious disease gone wrong - the timely graphic novel from Sunday Times bestselling author Val McDermid.

Our culture has tended to view dying as the end of our consciousness, the end of our existence - a dreaded prospect that for many people evokes fear and anxiety.But Dr Greyson shows how scientific revelations about the dying process can support an alternative theory.

Forensic pathologist and bestselling author of Unnatural Causes, Dr Richard Shepherd, brings his unparalleled honesty and insight to a new book about life and death.