The human mind is a brain plus consciousness and self-awareness, and the ability to reason. While intelligence, or IQ is hard to measure within a species and harder across animal species, humans are smarter than most animals. Our brains are huge compared to body weight. But scientists know little about how the mind really works. Find out what's known as LiveScience tracks the latest news and brings you feature stories, video and other new information about the mind.
Explore Mind
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- Music Improves Brain Function
- Researchers examine how the brain experiences and benefits from musical training.
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- Jerky Curveball: It's All An Illusion
- Look at the spinning ball directly. It seems to fly straight. But look at the blue dot and the ball's spin fools your brain into thinking that the ball is curving. A flyi...
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- The Power of Negative Thinking
- A new study suggests bad moods can make people less gullible and boost memory.
More Mind News and Information
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Why 'Sleeping on It' Helps
How does "sleeping on it" help your decision-making process?
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Speed of Thought-to-Speech Traced in Brain
Electrodes implanted in brains of epileptics show neural steps of language production.
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Do Cell Phones Cause Brain Tumors? Tough Call
A review of existing research discerned no overall link. But some studies found a link.
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Scientists See Numbers Inside People's Heads
Scientists can watch brain activity to decipher what number you're thinking of.
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Children Who Get Spanked Have Lower IQs
Spanking could shave points off kids IQs.
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People in Vegetative State Can Learn
Patients in a vegetative state or minimally conscious state can learn, scientist say
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Booze: Possible Treatment for Brain Injury
Study shows patients with alcohol in the bloodstream were less likely to die from head trauma than the alcohol-free.
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Validity of 'Repressed Memories' Challenged in Court
There is no scientific consensus that people can completely forget traumatic events and recall them years later.
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10 of Fiction's Biggest Brains
And as in life, fictional characters use their big brains for good or evil.
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Do Brains Shrink As We Age?
Scientists may have overestimated how much our brain shrinks as we age, a new study suggests
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Robot to Get Human Brain Cells
It's all cooked up in a broth of nutrients zapped by electricity.
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Brain Scans Often Unnecessary
Study finds that fMRI can do more harm than good.
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Your Brain Is Organized Like a City
Neurobiologist Mark Changizi sees strikingly real similarities between the two.
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Nostrils Take Turns Smelling
When confronted with two different smells, nostrils take turns smelling.
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What Makes a Psychopath? Answers Remain Elusive
Scientists are investigating if there are natural born killers.
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Seeing with Your Tongue

The Wicab BrainPort uses the tongue to sense incoming visual information,aimed at helping people who are blind or who have extremely low vision.
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New Theory Questions Why We Sleep
Researchers still can't figure out the reason we need shut-eye.
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Bionics Gives Blind Woman Partial Vision

A camera is built into a pair of glasses that sends signals to a tiny chip implanted in the back of the retina and stimulates nerves that lead to the vision center of the brain, helping seeing impaired people see again.
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Fire Used to Make Better Tools 75,000 Years Ago
Humans used fire to improve stone tools much earlier than thought, archaeologists found.
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Thanks, Fido! Cancer Drugs Tested on Pets
Pets with cancer can help scientists develop novel therapies against the disease
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Babies' Brains Churning With Activity
Baby's brain lights up when watching others grab for toys.
Mind Features
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