The word “control”, with its seemingly instantaneous mental associations with forms of top-down oppression, is one that makes even some cyberneticians nervous and is often downplayed in contemporary descriptions of the field.

Often, when writing the intellectual history of the Middle East, we make assumptions about the influence of ideas from other places on the Middle East itself. We assume what ideas are being adapted in their entirety and not necessarily as challenged an...

How and where do transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) people find good mental healthcare? And how can psychotherapists and other mental health professionals become competent in this kind of care? Furthermore,

After working clinically with patients for over 25 years, it’s natural that one would learn something about what heals or harms humans. Such is the case with Dr. Eva Ritvo, who discovered through her work and personal life the power of human kindness a...

Early studies of the functions of the human brain used a simple method: wait for misfortune to strike—strokes, seizures, infectious diseases, lobotomies, horrendous accidents-and see how the victim coped. In many cases survival was miraculous,

We all put a great deal of care into protecting, managing, and monitoring our reputation. But the precise nature of a reputation is obscure. In one sense, reputation is merely hearsay, a popular perception that may or may not have any basis in fact.

The biggest problem in American health care is us. Do you know how to tell good health care from bad health care? Guess again. As patients, we wrongly assume the best care is dependent mainly on the newest medications, the most complex treatments,

In her book, Be Mindful and Stress Less: 50 Ways to Deal with Your (Crazy) Life (Shambhala, 2018), Gina Biegel shows how the demands and pressures of everyday life can really stress you out! She shows how even the little things when stacked one on top ...

In her new book, The Battle Within: POWs in Postwar Australia (NewSouth Books, 2018), Christina Twomey, Professor of History at Monash University, explores the “battle within,” the individual and collective challenge of rehabilitating Australian prison...

Mentored by a Madman: The William Burroughs Experiment (Notting Hill Editions, 2017) is a fascinating account by one of the world’s leading and most decorated neurologists of the profound influence of William Burroughs on his medical career. Dr.

Dr. Radhule Weininger is a clinical psychologist and meditation teacher who integrates psychodynamic, Jungian and Gestalt psychotherapies with Buddhist psychology. In her new book Heartwork: The Path of Self-Compassion (Shambhala, 2017), Dr.

Betsy DiSalvo, assistant professor in the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology, joins us in this episode to discuss the recently published co-edited volume entitled, Participatory Design for Learning: Perspectives from Pra...

Anita Johnston, author of Eating in the Light of the Moon: How Women Can Transform Their Relationships with Food Through Myth, Metaphor, and Storytelling (Gurze Books, 2000), is an expert in the field of eating disorders treatment,

The two biggest problems of understanding the mind are consciousness and intentionality. The first doesn’t require introduction. The latter is the problem of how we can have thoughts and perceptions that about other things for example,

In the early twentieth century, Robert Hertz, a French anthropologist, and Cesare Lombroso, the Italian criminologist, debated the causes and consequences of left-handedness. According to Lombroso, left-handed individuals were more likely to be crimina...

Some people can’t help but be ‘awkward’ despite their lifelong efforts to blend in. They feel ashamed of their social ineptitude and end up shying away from social situations, yet research offers insights that could help. In his new book,

In The Ostrich Paradox: Why We Underprepare for Disasters (Wharton Digital Press, 2017), Robert Meyer and Howard Kunreuther summarize six major cognitive biases that explain why humans fail to adequately prepare for potential disasters.

Embracing a multi-perspectival authorial voice, Managing Madness: Weyburn Mental Hospital and the Transformation of Psychiatric Care in Canada (University of Manitoba Press, 2017), tells the story of the “last and largest” asylum in the British Commonw...

What if you suddenly discovered a cherished member of your family was a Nazi? How would you make sense of the code of silence that had kept an uncomfortable reality at bay? How would you resolve the wartime suffering of your family with their moral cul...

The Age of Lone Wolf Terrorism (Columbia University Press, 2017), by Mark S. Hamm and Ramon Spaaij, identifies patterns among individuals that commit acts of terror outside of a group or network. Hamm and Spaaij follow these individuals,

Are we good people? Or do we just think we are? In his new book The Character Gap: How Good Are We? (Oxford University Press, 2017), author Christian B. Miller tackles these questions and more, breaking down what character is, how to measure it,

Obesity and weight loss are notoriously challenging areas of research and intervention. Traditional behavioral psychology methods for weight loss are known to be ineffective in the long-term for many people.

Middle-agedness is a curious phenomenon. In many ways, one is at one’s peak and also at the early stages of decline. There is much to do, but also dozens of paths irretrievably untaken. Successes, but also regrets.

Who do people turn to when they want to talk about serious issues in their life? Do they end up confiding in people they list as confidants? In his new book, Someone to Talk To (Oxford University Press, 2017),

What is it to be moral, to lead an ethically good life? From a naturalistic perspective, any answer to this question begins from an understanding of what humans are like that is deeply informed by psychology, anthropology,