AlphaPsy

Mirror-Neurons have been losing much of their bourgeois respectability lately; they were supposed to be involved in empathy, imitation, culture, learning, theory of mind... now it turns out that they might be the brain's gateway to pornographic pleasure, and that some of them are gay.

The pictures show Giaccomo Rizzolatti, (straight) discoverer of mirror-neurons, and the beloved Arthur Rimbaud (by Fantin-Latour in the Musée d'Orsay).

Read more...

I just posted on the blog a dozen or so primers that Nicolas, Karim and I wrote for the AlphaPsy main site. These are really short introductions to various topics in the fields of evolution, cognition, and culture. It is chielfy aimed at social scientists with no background whatsoever in the domain. Each primer includes a link to the relevant AlphaPsy Bibliography, which is particularly suited for beginners. Again, it is only a very rough guide; it has no scientific ambitions, so don't judge it too harshly. Perhaps I'll try to work it into a Wikipedia entry, since I am told by Dario Taraborelli that there is none for cognitive anthropology.

Read more...