Something You Should Know - The Amazing Way Your Body Heals Itself & Why Your Reality is Different Than Mine

Episode Date: June 7, 2018

Ever feel good about saving a spider because you took it out of your house and put it outside rather than killing it? It seems like a noble thing to do. But what you may not know is what is likely to happen to that spider once you put it outside. This episode of the podcast starts with that interesting explanation. (http://www.burkemuseum.org/blog/curated/spider-myths) You probably don’t think about it much but the way your body heals itself from illness and injury is really remarkable. We are learning more and more about how the healing process works and how to enhance it. Joining me to shed some light on all of this is Wayne Jonas, MD, professor of medicine at Georgetown University and author of the book How Healing Works. (https://amzn.to/2JB911l ) We all make typos when we write emails. But what you probably realize is that those typos alter the impact of your message – sometimes in a good way and sometimes in a bad way. Listen as I explain. (https://www.aol.com/2015/06/01/your-email-typos-reveal-more-about-you-than-you-realize/) How you perceive your world is different than everyone else because your brain is so different than everyone else's. One great way to understand those differences in our brain is to look at some people with peculiar brain disorders. Science writer Helen Thomson author of the book Unthinkable: An Extraordinary Journey Through the World’s Strangest Brains (https://amzn.to/2M6kswj) introduces you to a woman who gets lost going from her kitchen to her bathroom EVERY single time as well as the doctor who actually feels other people’s pain. It’s important to hear this because it gives you a clue as to why your brain sees a very different reality than mine or anyone else's. Plus Helen offers some brain enhancing techniques you can use that she has learned from the science.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on Something You Should Know, ever felt charitable saving a spider and putting it outside? What do you think happens next to that spider? I'll explain that. Plus, we're going to explore the amazing ways your body heals itself, including the placebo effect. One of the myths about placebo is that you had to believe it. And therefore, if you told somebody they were on a placebo, it wasn't going to work. This was believed for long, long periods of time. Well, we now have research showing that that is not true. Also, when you make a typo in an email, something very interesting happens in the mind of the reader and the fascinating workings of the brain.

Some of this you won't believe. For example, something that we've discovered is we use what's going on inside our body to help us make decisions. It's called interoception and people who can count their heartbeat without touching your chest can make better decisions. All this today on Something You Should Know. As a listener to Something You Should Know, I can only assume that you are someone who likes to learn about new and interesting things and bring more knowledge to work for you in your everyday life. I mean, that's kind of what Something You Should Know was all about. And so I want to invite you to listen to another podcast called TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks Daily. Now, you know about TED Talks, right? Many of the guests on Something You Should Know have done TED Talks.

Well, you see, TED Talks Daily is a podcast that brings you a new TED Talk every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Join host Elise Hu. She goes beyond the headlines so you can hear about the big ideas shaping our future. Learn about things like sustainable fashion, embracing your entrepreneurial spirit, the future of robotics, and so much more. Like I said, if you like this podcast, Something You Should Know, I'm pretty sure you're going to like TED Talks Daily.

And you get TED Talks Daily wherever you get your podcasts. Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers. A couple of episodes ago, I mentioned that we had this big spike in the number of listeners to this podcast all of a sudden, one day, a few weeks ago, and we didn't know why. And I've been asked several times, did you ever find out why? And we did.

And it's kind of a complicated, not so interesting story. But essentially, one of the platforms on which you can listen to podcasts, including this one, we weren't seeing their listeners in our totals. We can see our numbers on a website and see how many people listen and when they listen. And their numbers weren't being added into our totals. They are now, and that's why the big spike in numbers. First up today, have you ever felt really noble when you find a spider in your house and you put it outside and save its life? Well, I hate to break it to you, but the chances of that spider making it out there in the real world are next to none,

according to University of Washington spider expert Rod Crawford. He says that fewer than 5% of household spiders have ever been outdoors. They have little in the way of street smarts to protect themselves from weather conditions, predators, and anything else that's out there. In essence, spiders become domesticated pretty quickly, so setting them free outdoors is likely not doing them a big favor. Of course, smacking them with a shoe is not doing them a big favor either. The good news is that a spider in the house is not the danger you may think it is. It is a myth that spiders are aggressive. None of them are.

In fact, all species run at the first sign of trouble, and they consider you, a human, as trouble. Consequently, it's unlikely that they're climbing into your bed and biting you in the middle of the night. You may find little bumps on your skin that you think are spider bites, but they are probably not. Even the brown recluse and black widow spiders, two types of spiders whose bites actually can do harm,

are unlikely to sink their teeth into you unless provoked. And that is something you should know. Have you ever stopped and thought about the miracle that is healing? I mean, you get sick with any and all sorts of illnesses, or you break a bone, and somehow your body heals itself. How does that work, and can you optimize it? And how does the placebo effect fit into this discussion? Well, here with some answers is Dr. Wayne Jonas.

He knows a thing or two about healing. He is a research scientist, family physician, and professor at Georgetown University. He is also author of a book called How Healing Works. Hi, Dr. Jonas. Welcome to Something You Should Know. Thank you. It's a great pleasure to be here. So this is one of those subjects that nobody thinks about very often, but when you do stop and think about it, I mean, think, you cut your finger as a simple example and it bleeds and then eventually it stops bleeding, and then eventually it just disappears as if it were never there.

I mean, it is rather amazing what the body can do to heal itself. How did you get interested in this? Well, I'm a conventionally trained medical doctor, and I got trained in what I thought was healing at the time, but what turns out to be really just about treatment of pathology. I got trained in pathogenesis, which means the generation of disease and how to stop it. And that is different than healing. Healing is the process of recovery, repair, reintegration, return to wholeness. It's how we get better. And if we weren't getting better all the time, as you say, you know, your cut just spontaneously somehow gets better, then we

wouldn't be around because it is the underlying process of healing or what is called salutogenesis, salute meaning health and genesis meaning the creation of, that really is what keeps us alive. And yet in medicine, we learn about the pathological side and how to stop it, which is why we have all the anti-drugs, antihypertensives, antibiotics, which are really great when we need to stop a disease. But we learn very little about healing and especially around both the prevention and reversal of disease to come back to wholeness. And so I realized as I went through my career that I was missing a huge part of what it

meant to get people well and to keep them well. And so I spent a large part of my career, my journey as a conventional medical physician, treating mostly people in the military and veterans, as well as then doing research at NIH and Walter Reed and other places, on a journey to discover how did healing happen? How does it work? What was the underlying processes and principles, and how can we optimize that in our healthcare system and in my own practice.

And in a nutshell, can you summarize in a sentence or two or three, how does healing work? Is it magic? Is it what happens? Well, first of all, you need to know that most of what we do in medicine only contributes to about 20% of actual health, actual health. You hear people say, well, if you're sick, go to your doctor and you'll get well. And the data is very clear that if everybody had platinum-level health insurance and had access to doctors and pills and procedures and specialists and others like the patients that I see have in the military, platinum-level health insurance, it would actually only improve the health of the nation

by about 15 to 20 percent. That 80 percent of what keeps people healthy goes on outside of your doctor's office. And so the phrase might be, well, if you want to get well, don't necessarily go to your doctor. That 80% actually comes from things that you do in your everyday life. It comes from the place that you live, the physical environment that you're in. It comes from the behaviors you engage in, nutrition, smoking, alcohol, sleep, stress management, physical activity. It comes from the social and emotional environment that you immerse yourself in with others, your social relationships. And it also comes from what I call the mental and the spiritual component. Are you doing what's important to you? Is it meaningful? Does it matter? And when those

things come together, now you have the access to the other 80%. And if you put it together with the medical treatment, you got 100%. And that's called true integrative health. So much of what you just said of the 80%, the eating and sleeping and social connection and all that. Maybe it's just because I interview a lot of people about this, but it seems to me that people, for the most part, know a good portion of that. They know they should eat better. They know they should exercise more. But they don't.

A lot of people don't. They choose not to, despite the evidence. So what do you do with those people who say, yeah, I understand that. I just choose not to. Yeah. Do they really choose that? We are immersed into a culture and a society that pushes us one direction.

If you were floating down a stream in one direction and suddenly ended up over the waterfall, would you say the person chose to do it? If they're trying to swim upstream. We are in a culture that tells us not to move. We run around in cars and buses. We're in a food environment that floods us with unhealthy food and makes it difficult to get access in many cases for many people to healthy food. And when we do have access, we're not quite sure how it affects us individually. We do know that we should be eating more healthily. We do know we should be moving. But we live in a culture that pushes us in the other direction. And again, the research is very clear about this over many, many, you know, decades has demonstrated this. And we also have a healthcare system that doesn't help us

to fix that problem. We have a healthcare system that says, you know, if you eat too many hot dogs, take an antacid instead of paying attention to, you know, what it is that you're doing. Just enjoy the hot dogs and just eat it and that will fix it. We have a medical system that puts you on medications to reduce cholesterol. That does reduce your risk factors, but not nearly as much as if it were to set up a way to facilitate your behavior change. And there's no reason it can't. And, in fact, in the book, I write many examples of health systems that have integrated systems for support in self-care to help people,

in fact, make those kinds of changes, arrange their environment so it's easier to make the right choices. And they find that it's not a matter of willpower. It's a matter of actually constructing and using the behavioral change principles that science shows work and making those part of healthcare delivery. I'm speaking with Dr. Wayne Jonas. He is a professor of medicine at Georgetown University, a practicing physician, and author of the book How Healing Works, Get Well and Stay Well Using Your Hidden Power to Heal. You know, I've already heard from a couple of people who bought a Quip toothbrush because they heard me talk about it here on the podcast. And they told me how glad they are they bought it. Which might sound weird because brushing your teeth probably isn't something you think about a lot or think about writing an email about.

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support this podcast, but you'll be doing something great for your health. Quip was on Oprah's O-List, name one of time's best inventions, and it is the toothbrush I use every day. Quip starts at just $25, and if you go to getquip.com slash something right now, you'll get your first refill pack free with a Quip electric toothbrush. That's your first refill pack free at getquip.com slash something. Spell G-E-T-Q-U-I-P dot com slash something. Since I host a podcast, it's pretty common for me to be asked to recommend a podcast.

And I tell people if you like something you should know, you're going to like The Jordan Harbinger Show. Every episode is a conversation with a fascinating guest. Of course, a lot of podcasts are conversations with guests, but Jordan does it better than most. Recently, he had a fascinating conversation with a British woman who was recruited and radicalized by ISIS and went to prison for three years. She now works to raise awareness on this issue. It's a great conversation.

And he spoke with Dr. Sarah Hill about how taking birth control not only prevents pregnancy, it can influence a woman's partner preferences, career choices, and overall behavior due to the hormonal changes it causes. Apple named The Jordan Harbinger Show one of the best podcasts a few years back, and in a nutshell, the show is aimed at making you a better, more informed, critical thinker. Check out The Jordan Harbinger Show. There's so much for you in this podcast. The Jordan Harbinger Show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Contained herein are the heresies of Rudolf Buntwine, erstwhile monk turned traveling medical investigator. Join me as I study the

secrets of the divine plagues and uncover the blasphemous truth that ours is not a loving God and we are not its favored children. The Heresies of Randolph Bantwine, wherever podcasts are available. So, Dr. Jonas, talk about the placebo effect, because that is something that's always fascinated me, because it's, it really does seem to work, and yet it is also like magic. Well, this is one of the things people should know about. I love the title of your show, Something You Should Know. One of the things that you should know about is this, what I call the sleeping elephant in science, in clinical science, the placebo effect. Placebo's got a bad rap.

It has sort of a negative connotation. Oh, it's only the placebo effect. Well, therefore, it doesn't exist. No, it is the placebo effect, and underlying it are a set of rituals, beliefs, hypotheses, et cetera, that when you engage in those rituals actually produce the healing. And so we should be infusing every one of our therapies with the underlying components of placebo effects. And we know what those are.

We know that they are expectation and belief. They are ritual and a process called conditioning in which you take the pill in which you feel the physiological response and then that pill then conditions you to respond in a positive way. But do you have to believe that it's something that it isn't? Or can you say, this pill has absolutely no medicinal value whatsoever, but I'm going to take it and feel better and actually feel better, or must you be tricked? You know, here's one of the most interesting things about recent research on placebo.

One of the myths about placebo is that you had to believe it consciously, and, you know, the front part of your brain. And therefore, if you told somebody they were on a placebo, it wasn't going to work. This was believed for long, long periods of time. It's why we set up double-blind placebo-controlled trials, right? Because if people knew they were on a placebo, we thought it wouldn't work. Well, we now have research showing that that is not true, that what you believe in your conscious mind, in the front part of your head, actually contributes a very small amount to the healing that a placebo or taking a placebo produces.

Most of the placebo occurs from the culture you get immersed in and the ritual of therapy that you go through. So there's now multiple studies in a number of different conditions showing that you can tell somebody that you're giving them a placebo, and if you will tell them, well, as long as you go through the ritual, you go see the doctor, you hear about what the effects are, and they're an authoritative individual that has good science behind them and believability behind them, and you take and do the ritual, you do the therapy, you take the pills, etc., you're going to get well for the vast majority of that anyway.

And that's been shown in back pain and, you know, allergies and a variety of different conditions. So can I go buy some sugar pills and tell myself that this is going to, you know, relieve my back pain, and it will? Well, you know, it's funny. Most of the effect of placebo comes from the word I just used, the therapeutic ritual. The therapeutic ritual is the social encounter and interaction that is embedded in our, not only our psyche, but our own physiological response, where you go in when you're sick, you interact with a healer of some type, and you go through that ritual, the dialogue that goes on, the behavioral components of that. And so going

through the ritual is very important in terms of that. And that is a key part. The mechanisms underlying that are being worked out. They're called social learning. They're called conditioning. And if you do that, then you can get better, yes, for many, many conditions. Not everything. I mean, this is not to cure cancer, for example. It's not going to stop a heart attack. Yeah, but for the average, but for the things that it does work for, if you take a hundred people and put them through those rituals, statistically, what percentage of them respond to the placebo effect versus don't? Well, the vast majority of them respond.

There's a study that was a large study on back pain, for example, that did something called open placebo, which is the way they study this type of myth and mystery that is so important for people to understand, in which they actually say, well, this is a pill. It is a placebo. But if you actually go to the doctor, you get it, you start taking it, you're going to feel better. And they find that, you know, good, you know, 60, 70% of people, they will in fact feel better. Their back pain will improve, et cetera, even knowing that. Compared to not going through the ritual, comparing simply, you know, not getting any kind of treatment, not engaging with their physician, et cetera. You know, this is one of the things that perpetuates the thinking that what your doctor does is

actually producing the effect. If you're sick and you go in and you see your doctor, the most likely thing to happen because of your own body's own inherent healing capacity is that you're going to get better. If then your doctor gives you something or tells you to do something and you do it and you get better, you attribute it to what was done, right? Sure. But that's actually just because the spontaneous healing occurs. But now you think it's because of the pill or the procedure that you've done. And this applies to complementary medicine like acupuncture. It applies to conventional medicine like surgery. That regression to the mean, which is a statistical thing that you're going to get better anyway,

is used and it makes us think that what we're doing is producing the effect when what's producing the effect is our own inherent healing processes. And so let's dig up those factors that produce those inherent healing processes and make those part of every encounter that we have. But in a way, it doesn't really matter, does it? I mean, whether it's the doctor or it's not the doctor, if you go and you get better, who cares? Well, a lot of people don't care. You care if your payment for the treatment is dependent upon the belief that what you're doing is scientifically based

and is actually producing the effect, then you do care. You do care if what the physician or what you're doing might be harmful. You don't want to do something that's harmful in those areas. And if the science shows that this does add on top of the spontaneous healing processes, then that gives you even more boost. If the treatment is going to give you 20 to 30 percent more benefit than, you know, just doing something or anything, then why not do that rather than do something that's not going to do that? So science does have a role in it, but it is not the be-all and end-all of everything. It's really good for generating new knowledge and understanding.

We need to do good evidence, but we also need to understand that it's got its limitations and that really the power for healing and of healing lies in you. And if you can understand that and access that regularly, then any kind of evidence-based treatment will be enhanced and be made more effective. You mentioned at the beginning that there is reason to believe that connection, social connection, that kind of thing works to improve health or keep you healthy. Is it understood how that works, or we just know it does work? social connection, that kind of thing works to improve health or keep you healthy. Is it understood how that works, or we just know it does work? Well, we know a lot about how it works.

We certainly don't know everything about it. You know, social support and social connection is a huge factor in keeping people healthy and helping them to recover. I tell the story in my book about my wife who was undergoing treatment for breast cancer, major surgery, long-term chemotherapy. She needed ongoing healing processes to be, her own healing processes to be optimized as much as possible. And she did that by creating a space, a physical healing space that reduced her stress and allowed her to sleep and do imagery and recover. And she did it by surrounding herself in those who provided social support for her. And one of the underlying mechanisms that both of those things do is that they reduce the stress response that occurs that produces what's called fight or flight

and increases inflammation, increases cortisol, and increases or retards the healing processes that go on. You know, the opposite of the fight or flight and the stress response is the relaxation response coined by Herb Benson many, many years ago of Harvard. And that is when repair occurs. It's when toxins get eliminated. It's when our body begins to fix itself. It's when we recover.

And so if you can provide a space to do that, and social support provides a way in which you can relax into that process, and the physical space can too, then you can optimize the recovery process that occurs. And that's what she did. Well, it's certainly interesting and in some ways empowering to hear that when we go to the doctor and get a pill or whatever, it's really only 20% of the equation and the other 80% is really in many ways up to us. Dr. Wayne Jonas

has been my guest. He's a research scientist, family physician, and professor at Georgetown University. His book is called How Healing Works and there is a link to his book in the show notes. Thank you, Dr. Jonas. Thanks for being here. Good to talk to you. Bye-bye. People who listen to Something You Should Know are curious about the world, looking to hear new ideas and perspectives. So I want to tell you about a podcast that is full of new ideas and perspectives, and one I've started listening to called Intelligence Squared. It's the podcast where great minds meet. Listen in for some great talks on science, tech, politics, creativity, wellness, and a lot more. A couple of recent examples, Mustafa Suleiman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, discussing the future of technology.

That's pretty cool. And writer, podcaster, and filmmaker John Ronson discussing the rise of conspiracies and culture wars. Intelligence Squared is the kind of podcast that gets you thinking a little more openly about the important conversations going on today. Being curious, you're probably just the type of person Intelligence Squared is meant for. Check out Intelligence Squared wherever you get your podcasts. Hey everyone, join me, Megan Rinks. for. Check out Intelligence Squ our hot takes on current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our Lister poll results from But Am I Wrong?

And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday, where we catch up and talk all things pop culture. Listen to Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong? on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. A few weeks ago, everyone was all abuzz about the Laurel Yanny audio file. And if you don't know about it, it's this audio file of a synthesized voice that was all over the internet. And when people hear it, some people hear the word Laurel

and some people hear the word Yanny. Here's the file. Yanny. Yanny. Yanny. Yanny. Now, when I just played that, I heard Laurel. But I've listened to this exact same file, this audio file, and other times I've heard Yanny. And some people swear it says Laurel and other people swear it says Yanny. And it's so weird to me that two people can hear the same thing and yet their brains perceive very different things. Why do our brains do that? With some answers and other insight into how your brain works, meet Helen Thompson.

She's a science writer and author of a book called Unthinkable, an extraordinary journey through the world's strangest brains. Hi, Helen. Welcome. Hi, thanks for having me. So what's the backstory here? You didn't wake up one day and decide, you know, I need to talk to people with strange brains. So what's the story here? So I have a degree in neuroscience, and then I trained to be a science journalist with a science master's, science communication master's. And I ended up working at New Scientist magazine, where I wrote about the brain. And the ones that fascinated me the most were brains that didn't look like everybody else's and I began finding case studies written in scientific journals of

people who had strange brain disorders and gradually over time got a chance to actually talk to some of these case studies and find out a bit more about their lives. And they just had these fascinating stories to tell. And that led me to end up on a journey around the world for a couple of years, meeting up with 10 people who have the world's strangest brain disorders to find out about their lives and how it affected them. And for meeting these people with brain disorders what's the big takeaway what did you learn what is the most fascinating thing about what they have to say well from having studied um and traveled around the world meeting these people with with these

incredible brain disorders the thing that has fascinated me the most is how different our perceptions of the world can actually be and and how even those of us who consider ourselves to have a so-called normal brain actually might be seeing the world very different to other people you know we don't actually ever really think about our own perceptions of the world because, you know, what we experience every day. And we tend to assume that they're like everybody else's, but they actually can be very different. And there's nothing wrong with that. And I think the more we do find out about the brain, I think the more we realize that there is no such thing as this optimal normal brain. And actually, we all have different traits and see the world just

ever so slightly differently to one another. And I think that's really fascinating to find out how we all look at the world differently and how that sort of comes about within the brain. So give me some examples of how people see things differently. Well, a very obvious example is, I'm sure your listeners have came across it a couple of years ago with the blue black dress. That was a picture of a blue and black dress that went viral online. And some people swore that they saw it as blue and black. And some people said, no, it's definitely white and gold. And that was a very simple case of showing us that actually the colors that we see in the world aren't just out there for us to see.

Our brains actually interpret color and in doing so actually see different colors. And I urge you to go and check out that picture if you haven't seen it already. But some of the people in my book, book um for instance joel is actually a colorblind synesthete which means that synesthesia is something in which your senses are crossed so one sense stimulates another it could be that um the hit the sound of a bell stimulates the taste of a lemon in your in your mind in your mouth and And that's because our senses are crossed. And in Joel's case, his sense of color is crossed with a part of the brain that's responsible for emotion. And that means that whenever he feels strong emotion towards a person or a place or an object,

he actually sees a colored aura around that person or that object. And he sees all of these fascinating colours in the world that most of us don't see. The fact that he's colourblind actually makes his story even more interesting because he can't see certain colours in the real world because he has a problem in his eyes, which make him colourblind. But actually, he sees coloured auras in his mind of colours that he can't see in the real world because they're coming directly from his brain and not through his eyes. And he has these fascinating stories to tell. But, I mean, you don't have to have a condition like Joel's in order to experience different colors in the world like the blue and black dress um showed us but also we all um for instance another example again in the in the book

is a woman who has really awful navigation skills she's actually gets lost between her own bathroom and kitchen and that's because she can't she can't create a mental map of her world. And it means that the mental map that she creates in her mind of where things are doesn't match the world around her. And it's incredibly disorientating. But again, she doesn't have this unique, completely unique trait. It's actually an extreme version of something that we all have, is you know she's she has problems creating a mental map and and some of us have problems not quite to that extreme extent but um you know when you start talking about these things you realize that there's lots of people who get very very disorientated and and and some people on the other end of the the scale who are brilliant at at

navigating and and so there's all these these in the brain, there's all these ways in which our brain creates this mental landscape and this perception of our world. And sometimes it's just very different to other people's. Well, I've always wondered, like, when I see the color red, is it the same color red that you see? Or is it something that you can't even possibly imagine? Exactly. It's such a fundamentally hard question to answer. And I think that's why nobody really does question their own perception of the world. And it's why so many people who have these extraordinary perceptions only find out about them when they're in their 20s, say.

And because we don't tend to think that your red is any different to my red, but it could be completely different. But it's really impossible to be able to put myself into your brain and sort of see your red. Right, but regardless of whether we'll ever know whether my red is the same as your red, we both agree it's red, but in the case of that dress on the internet or the Laurel Yanny audio, people are not hearing the same thing. They're hearing different things. So what is the brain doing that makes us hear different things or see

different things? In the dress case, it seemed to be laying on some kind of perceptual boundary which which means that it wasn't clear what kind of light the the picture was taken in and so some people's brains compensate for a more bluish kind of light and some people's brains compensate for more golden kind of light and and then that's why they come up with um their brains interpret the color either as blue and black or as white and gold and and and it just you know some people's brain seems to pick a different light to compensate for um each time they look at the picture well what fascinated me about that was okay so different people hear and see different things in those cases. And we know that some people see the dress one way and some people see it another way. And that those are the only, basically, the two choices.

Nobody was seeing it a third way. It was just either the A or B. And my brain is seeing it the way it sees it. But it's my brain. Why can't I tell my brain to see it the other way? It's a good question. There are just aspects of our brain that we don't have ultimate control of. They're automatic processes that go on. It's like if we see a rabid dog in front of us, our palms will start sweating. We might get a jolt of adrenaline, our heart races. And those are kinds of things that we don't have control over. They're there for our survival, they're there for

a good reason. And it's just the way that the brain works and they all have a good reason for these things happening automatically or on the other side of things, having conscious control over some aspects of our brain. So with the understanding that we have of some of these brain disorders and how the brain works, are there things that we can do, knowing that, to better use our own brains? Sure. So one of the first people I met was Bob, and he has something called highly superior autobiographical memory. And it means that he never forgets a single day of his life. So if you were to ask him what he had for lunch and what he was wearing and how he was feeling on the 6th of January 1987, he'd be able to tell you and he would remember it as if it happened yesterday and by studying

people like Bob and and also by studying people like the world memorizers who can sort of remember pi to hundreds of thousands of digits we've discovered lots of tricks that we can use to improve our own memories and so for instance we've discovered that the brain loves storing things we want to remember as images. It much prefers it over words. So if you want to remember a list of a shopping list, say, for instance, you would be best for trying to picture these items as images. And the second thing we found out is that the brain loves storing memories in an orderly location so this is a trick that you can that memory super memorizers memory champions use to remember hundreds of things if you want to remember say a list you first need to think about

these things as images and then you need to leave them around what's called a mind palace which you might have heard of if you're a fan of Sherlock Holmes where them around what's called a mind palace which you might have heard of if you're a fan of Sherlock Holmes where it's often mentioned and a mind palace is a location that you know well say your house or your route to work and what you do to remember a list of items is that you just walk along your your mind palace say your route to work, and you drop off those items at certain places along your route. And you'll find that actually if you then retrace your steps backwards or forwards, you'll be able to pick up the items and remember them so much better than if you just try to memorize a plain list of words.

And what about making better decisions? Because I think everybody could certainly use that skill. So this is a bit more subtle. This is a brand new sort of area of research. So something that we've discovered is we use what's going on inside our body to help us make decisions. It's called interoception. And people who can identify and count their heartbeat without touching your your chest or feeling for your pulse. People who are more accurate are actually better empathizing. They can make better decisions. And so it's something you can you can try and practice. Just I mean, actually, when people try to touch their chest, if people try to count their heartbeat without um touching their chest we find

that about 50 of people are about 50 out so we're actually not very good at it um and there and so researchers are trying to find ways of us perhaps becoming better at understanding and being able to interpret what's going on in our body because these things seem to influence how we live our life, how we make decisions and various other aspects of our life. And one thing they've discovered is that if you're looking in a mirror or you're looking at words that describe yourself, you're actually better at being able to count your own heartbeat. You're better at being able to understand what's going on in your body. And although this hasn't been then taken on to the next step yet, they think that this might be a way of us all improving our own interoception and us, it might then be a way of us, you know,

improving ourselves by being able to make better decisions, for instance. But what's the connection if we know it? What's the connection between being able to count your heartbeat and making better decisions for instance but what's the connection if we know it what's the connection between being able to count your heartbeat and making better decisions there's nothing concrete yet but we know that the way that our brain comes to a decision is by taking into account everything that's going on around us in the world and also how our body is reacting to it all those automatic things that like our raised heart rates our sweaty palms our our jolts of adrenaline and it incorporates all this information together and up pops the best solution using all the data and information that we have available to us and so if we're better able to identify what's going on in our body,

then we might be able to make a better decision because we've got better data available to us to make that decision. Is there anything else from all you've learned about the brain and the way it works and doesn't work, anything else that we could use in our own lives to help ourselves and help our brains? If we go back to the idea of navigation and Sharon, who gets lost even between her own bathroom and kitchen because of this problem with creating a mental map of her world. By studying people like Sharon or other people

who are really bad navigators, scientists have discovered this trick that we can all use to be better navigators. They found that if you're ever in a new area, if you're ever, say, in a new city and you're walking around, you should really take note of really good permanent landmarks and where they are in location to each other. So maybe a church or a really novel street sign or things that are going to stay put and if you really concentrate on them as you're walking around and you think about where they are in location to one another you'll find that on your way back or your next time in that bit of the city you'll be better able to create a mental map of that area and you'll be better

able to find your way around you'll be a much better navigator. And that's because you've given this area of the brain better information on which to create this new map of your environment. And that's a trick that I love using now and I find it works every time I'm in a new place. Well, there's no doubt that the brain is fascinating the way it works and fascinating the way it doesn't work. When you have people with brain disorders. It's a real glimpse into how the brain works and what happens when it goes wrong. My guest has been Helen Thompson. She's a science writer and her book

is called Unthinkable, an extraordinary journey through the world's strangest brains. There's a link to her book in the show notes. Thanks, Helen. Appreciate you being here. Well, thank you for having me. Like everyone else, you occasionally make typos in your email, which is no big deal. But there is an unintended consequence you probably never considered. When a researcher at Harvard Business School had test subjects read an angry email from a fictional sender, they saw that person as angrier when the note had typos in it. When he did the same thing with a joyful email, the typos made the sender come across even more joyful.

In other words, typos act as an emotional amplifier. Since written communication is words only, there are no facial or verbal clues to give the reader any insight into the writer. So essentially, the reader takes whatever clues they can get, and typos seem to give the clue that whatever emotion you're conveying is even stronger. The bad news is that those same typos also convey to the reader that you're less intelligent and that your response is being driven by emotion, not by careful thought. But that may be okay in some situations. If a typo in a sincere email makes you seem more sincere, it may be worth the price of not appearing all that

bright. And that is something you should know. If you like the information, stories, and interviews you hear on this podcast, I invite you to follow us on social media where we post additional content that doesn't make it into the show. We're on Facebook,

Twitter, and LinkedIn. Well, on LinkedIn you'd have to follow me, but I'm there and would love to have you follow us. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced.

She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth. Chinook, starring Kelly Marie Tran and Sanaa Lathan. Listen to Chinook wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Jennifer, a co-founder of the Go Kid Go Network. At Go Kid Go, putting kids first is at the heart of every show that we produce. That's why we're so excited to introduce a brand new show to our network

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