Top 10 Myths About the Brain

The brain is one of the most amazing organs in the human body. It controls our central nervous system, keeping us walking, talking, breathing and thinking. The brain is also incredibly complex, comprising around 100 billion neurons. There's so much going on with the brain that there are several different fields of medicine and science devoted to treating and studying it, including neurology, which treats physical disorders of the brain; psychology, which includes the study of behavior and mental processes; and psychiatry, which treats mental illnesses and disorders. Some aspects of each tend to overlap, and other fields cross into study of the brain as well.
These disciplines have been around in some form since ancient times, so you'd think that by now we'd know all there is to know about the brain. Nothing could be further from the truth. After thousands of years of studying and treating every aspect of it, there are still many facets of the brain that remain mysterious. And because the brain is so complex, we tend to simplify information about how it works in order to make it more understandable.
Both of these things put together have resulted in many myths about the brain. Most aren't completely off -- we just haven't quite heard the whole story. Let's look at 10 myths that have been circulating about the brain, starting with, of all things, its color.

10 Amazing Things People's Brains Have Done

The human brain can do some amazing things - and humans can do amazing things because of it. Just to name one example, we can accept light along the visible wavelength reflected from objects in our environment into our eyes. Our optic nerves convert that light into electrochemical impulses, which is the language the brain uses to communicate. As this electricity passes along a neural network, it reaches the hippocampus, the region of the brain responsible for analyzing and categorizing these impulses.
These categories determine which region of the brain receives the impulses routed by the hippocampus. So, an impulse sent to the visual cortex suddenly becomes a large green metal road sign that we understand as our exit. We veer the car off the highway and continue on toward the grocery store happy as a lark.

Even the most mundane operations of our brains are pretty amazing. Those feats, however, are nothing compared to some of the things that a small handful of people's brains have done. What follows, in no particular order, is a tidy list of some of the most amazing -- and horrible -- things that people's brains have ever done.

Top 5 Ways to Get Smarter

What is smart? Some people judge smarts by standard benchmarks like test scores and grade point averages. Others think common sense, problem solving abilities and "street smarts" define intelligence. Standardized testing scores have proven unreliable and biased along racial and socioeconomic lines, and cramming for classes can lead to GPAs that aren't a true indicator of intelligence.
While we can't all agree on a standard for intelligence, we can agree that the human brain is the key to all of them. It has a great capacity to adapt, rewire and grow. Neural networks expand and strengthen through learning experiences. Stimuli make the brain stronger and more vital. This reinforcement of the brain's power affects intelligence across all standards, from street smarts to testing scores. Here are five ways you can increase your brain's capacity to take in and store new data. Or, said more simply, here's how you can get smarter.

10 Really Smart People Who Did Really Dumb Things

Do you have a friend who's super smart, but when it comes to street smarts he's ... let's say "lacking"? Even the smartest people pull dumb moves sometimes, and for some reason it's extra surprising and disappointing when a smart person screws up. How could that president or general carry on an affair knowing it could easily get out? How did that company CEO think he could embezzle millions and no one would find out?
The truth is that book smarts or business savvy don't make a person perfect. Or streetwise. In fact, smart people seem prone to spectacular lapses in judgment more so than "average" people.
Why? One study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology gave logic problems to people to solve and found that smart people tended to make more mistakes than those of average intellect, because smart people were more likely to take shortcuts or make assumptions due to overconfidence. This is called the bias blind spot.
Of course, overconfidence isn't the only road to a dumb decision. Many of the dumb choices you'll see on this list were motivated by greed, pride, stress, and even sheer laziness. Let's look at 10 memorable moments of "what were you thinking?"