Encephalon #90

I haven't done much reading or writing for the past month. And my presence online has been practically non-existent as well. In my defense, my thesis is due in a little more than a month. But, digging me up from my temporary stupor is Encephalon, the blog carnival which features the best of neuroscience and psychology blog posts.

So, prepare your cup (or cups) of coffee and dive in August's best blog posts:

• My fellow Scitable blogger, Taylor Burns, has a guest post over at Scientific American entitled, "Pseudoscience and the London Riots: Folk Psychology Run Amok." Because, yes, sometimes it's worth reminding that psychology is an actual science.
• In case you missed it, superstar science blogger, Mo Costandi, is now blogging at The Guardian. His first post, "The illusion of attention," amongst other things, talks about the invisible gorilla psych experiment. A great blog post which will make you eager for more. So it's fitting that Mo published his interview with Daniel Simons, one of the scientists who came up with the invisible gorilla experiment, over on Google+ (you don't need to have an account to read it)!
• Jason G. Goldman at Scientific American has been busy which is good news for the whole bunch of us, readers. "Mathematics, cities, and brains: what can a highway engineer learn from a neuroscientist?" and "How do you figure out how chimps learn? Peanuts" are both fascinating blog posts. But you guessed that already.
• Grad student Mark Flanagan blogs about the neuroscience of mindfulness and stress over at Neuroanthropology. It's worth the read even if you're not stressed.
• Zen Faulkes talked neuroethology when he blogged about a paper which showed the relationship between the touch response of the worm and the hunting success of the fungus. And you thought neuroscience was only about our human brains.
• "Does language exist?" With a title like this, there is no need for me to tell you more about this Blair Bolles blog post.
• The brain and the mind, the mind and the brain... In her blog post, Janet Kwasniak talks about science's say in dualism.
• The savant syndrome! Because brain damage can be good sometimes. By Romeo Vitelli.