When it comes to sensory information detected by the body, pain is king, and itch is the court jester. But that insistent, tingly feeling—satisfied only by a scratch—is anything but funny to the millions of people who suffer from it chronically. Garden-variety itches related to histamine, like the kind caused by an angry rash of chicken pox or poison ivy, annoy everyone, but most can be subdued with drugs like Benadryl. But another type of itch is not mollified by these drugs, and therein lies the rub. Pathological itch — called the “itch that laughs at Benadryl” by neuros... (p. 16)

We have a well-honed ability for branding the undesirable attributes of “others.” This natural human tendency has evolved and persists for a reason: The definition of an outcast group helps society to delineate its “normal” boundaries. But this inclination can also breed counterproductive stigmas that are rooted in ignorance and that too often translate into staggering individual, social and economic costs. This makes the need to understand and confront these types of stigmas much more than a purely academic goal. Sociologists like Gerhard Falk are quick to distinguish ...

With gargantuan ears, gleaming brown eyes, a fuzzy white muzzle and a squat, furry body, Leonardo looks like a magical creature from a Harry Potter book. He’s actually a robot powered by an innovative set of silicon innards. Like a typical 6-year-old child, but unlike standard robots that come preprogrammed with inflexible rules for thinking, Leonardo adopts the perspectives of people he meets and then acts on that knowledge. Leonardo’s creators, scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Personal Robots Group and special effects aces at the Stan Winston Stu... (p. 24)

When one of psychiatrist Andrew Miller’s patients asked about receiving the best drug available for treating hepatitis C, Miller said: “No way.” The patient — in his early 20s and accompanied by his mom to the appointment — had no job, few friends and a history of depression. While Miller knows that hepatitis C patients often benefit from the new generation of immune-boosting treatments, he’s keenly aware that those same immune therapies have a strong tendency to bring people down — and, in people predisposed to depression, dangerously down. Certain immune ...

People nonverbally impose a specific order on descriptions of witnessed events, a tendency that may influence the structure of new languages, a new study suggests.